MARGARET OF AUSTRIA REGENT OF THE NETHERLANDS

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Margaret of Austria, ra&unt of
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O

OF AUSTRIA

^Margaret

OF AUSTRIA

of

THE NETHERLANDS

By Jane de longn

TRANSLATED BY M. D. HESTER NORTON

W W NORTON & COMPANY INC New York

COPYRIGHT 1953 BY
W. W. NORTON Sc COM1PANY, INC.

PRINTKD IK THK TJNITBD STATBS OF AMERICA
FOR XHB PUBX-ISHERS BY THJ VAII--BAI-XX>X; PRJESS

(Contents

ILLUSION IN STONE - 11

The Pawn

1 - Archduchess of Austria - 17

2 Queen of France - 45

3 Crown Princess of Spain - 79

4 Duchess of Savoy - 105

The Chess Player

5 - Regent of the Netherlands * 131

6 - Notre Bonne Tante - 161

7 - The Roman Crown - 187

8 - Ladies' Peace -219
Fortune, Infortune, Fortune ... - 249

Bibliography of Principal \Vorks Consulted - 255

5

Illustrations

facing page

Margaret of York 48

Charles the Bold 49

Mary of Burgundy 80

Emperor Maximilian I 81

Margaret of Austria at the Age of Three 112

Margaret of Austria at the Age of Ten 113

Philip the Handsome 144

Philibert of Savoy and Margaret of Austria 145

Margaret of Austria 176

Charles V as a Boy 177

Charles V 208

Margaret of Austria 209

OF

CO

r* *^ '

S gjw &
* &*

Illusion in Stone

church stands outside the town, as if set down by
chance beside one of those straight French highways,
opposite some low cottages, a little inn. It takes its name of
Brou from these poor outskirts. The neighborhood is quiet.
For Bourg-en-Bresse, which begins a little further along the
road with a few scattered houses, while once the center of
the Duchy of Savoy, is now a dreamy provincial town where
the steps of a school child echo distinctly between the gray
French houses.

The town has been forgotten. But the church of Brou is
full of memories. Through its cool spaces a gentle light
sifts between the blank white walls. There in graceful petri-
fied motion rise the three princely tombs with their embrac-
ing garlands of twining flowers and clustered fruits.

Chiseled in marble, hewn in stone, incised in bronze and
brass, there runs along the walls like a whisper, the wise de-
vice of the woman who built this church in fulfillment of
a promise, in memory of her own brief happiness:

Fortune, Infortune, Fortune . . .

IX

12 Margaret of Austria

A simple decoration and yet full of mystery, alternating
with a border soothing in its delicate intimacy: the inter-
woven initials P.-M. Philibert-Marguerite which make
this church interior a shrine of other than divine love alone.

The cool light surrounds the tombs standing motionless
in the silence. The figures of those whose repose was the
sole purpose of this perfect flower of late Gothic art lie out-
stretched under their baldaquins, ringed about by frolic-
some cherubs, by elegantly clad "virtues" with courtly air.
They lie there in dual representation, both as life knew them,
in the costume of their princely existence, and as idealizing
death left them to posterity: Philibert of Savoy, called the
Handsome, and Marguerite, his wife, who never forgot her
short-lived joy and who, after a life full of responsibilities
and struggles, returned to this quiet spot where she had pre-
pared her own tomb beside her husband's, and beside that
of the mother-in-law whose pledge she had redeemed by
the building of this sanctuary.

Inside, the windows sparkle with their enchanting light,
the only spots of color in all the still whiteness. They rep-
resent the two young rulers in all the splendor that sur-
rounded them during their few happy years of married life.
They gleam like jewels, these windows, and enhance the
calm solemnity of the interior, filled as with a soundless
music by the rhythm of its architecture. The grief that gave
rise to this structure is transfigured into an angelic joy, a
touching beauty that echoes like a cry of jubilation in the
heart.

Fortune, Infortune, Fortune . . .
This jewel of Flemish Gothic, which stands in the now

Illusion in Stone 13

French country of Bresse, is like a crystallization of the lif e
of its builder: Marguerite, Archduchess of Austria, Duchess
of Savoy, Regent of the Netherlands.

The straight highway leaves. Bourg-en-Bresse in a north-
westerly direction. It is the road that leads to the native land,
the field of work, the deathbed of a great woman. The road
that takes us to Flanders, to the good city of Ghent. . . .

THE

Le temps est trouble, le temps se esclarcira;
Apres la plue Ton atent le beau temps;
Apres noises et grans divers contens
Paix advietxdra et maleur cessera.

Mais entre deulx que mal Fon souffrera!
Dire on pourra par ung moderer sens:

Le temps est trouble*

De murmur er qui se desrivera

Mal il fera, car, ainsi que j'entens,

Au temps qui court temps perdent regretens,

Taire est bien bon a cil qui pensera:

Le temps est trouble.

The time is troubled, but the time will clear;
After rain fair weather is awaited;
After strife and cruel great contention
Peace will arrive, misfortune cease to be.

But meanwhile how much evil we shall suffer!
One may well say in another sense:

The time is troubled.

But anyone who murmurs in complaint
Does ill, for, as I understand,
In this our time, regretting but wastes time,
Silence is best for anyone who thinks:

The time is troubled.

CHAPTER ONE

ArcUwhtss of Austria

HE Damoiselle of Burgundy had no brother.
JL Her father, after the early death of her mother, had
indeed remarried. But Mary remained a lonely child amidst
the bizarre magnificence of that travel-smitten court. Time
went on. Mary's stepmother remained childless. And in-
creasingly Mary's fate took form according to the all-
dominating fact: she had no brother. Some day she would
inherit the lands over which her father ruled with all the
recklessness of his bitter and determined temperament.

For her father was Duke Charles, busy acquiring for him-
self the name of "le Temeraire" which has clung to him
through the ages and which in English became "the Bold 7 ',
Had it been granted his subjects to decide by what name
this duke should be known to history, they would perhaps
have called him "the Scourge". But a people, which bears
the burdens of its rulers' fame and sees its business and its
industry destroyed, its flourishing cities go to ruin, cannot
be unprejudiced, and it is as well that it seldom stands god-
father to its princes.

17

2 8 The fawn

Mary was eleven years old when her father married again.
She was a gentle and obedient child, who knew how to ad-
just herself to the inevitable, and she understood to the full
the responsibility that rested upon her when, on a certain
fine day in the year 1468, in the company of her grand-
mother, Isabella of Portugal, and with a glittering escort of
nobles and ladies of the court, she journeyed to Sluis to greet
her new stepmother, who had arrived there the previous day
from England. Mary was accustomed to travels and journey-
ings, and formal receptions were nothing new to her. But
this meeting was not merely a dramatic show which she
might watch with her prematurely wise child-eyes. This
event closely concerned herself, and it seemed she must be
conscious of the weight of the moment when she first looked
up to the radiant creature who now, somewhat embarrassed,
but touched to gentleness by the girlish face before her,
entered into her life.

For Margaret of York this moment was no less moving.
With the resignation every princess had sooner or later to
learn, she had accepted her lot when European politics made
desirable her marriage with the morose but powerful Duke
of Burgundy. But her personal fate as a woman was still un-
decided. It might yet turn to good or bad. Of what awaited
her she knew but this: a fabulously rich, famous, and fame-
seeking husband, about whose virtues and manly charms she
had been told unverifiable wonders; a mother-in-law related
to the Lancasters, the arch-enemies of her own house; a
stepdaughter who was still a child. The sea trip, that danger-
ous voyage, had for many reasons been exciting. And now
she was standing face to face with Mary, a gentle and very
small girl in a heavy and stately festive dress, and she rec-

Archduchess of Austria 19

ognized in the soft gray-brown eyes, in the smooth, very
pale child's face, the victim of a fate, like hers still undecided:
a human being whose lot was sacrifice.

Margaret embraced the child. The Burgundian retinue,
their attention divided between this moving little scene
and the beauties from England who surrounded the new
Duchess, nevertheless felt the emotion of this meeting.
Beauty quickly wakens tenderness. And Margaret of York
brought to her Burgundian marriage not only die advantages
of a close relation with England that were essential to the
welfare of the Low Countries she brought not only a tire-
less energy, an excellent intelligence, a practical common
sense, but an impressive beauty also, which was to inspire
Hans Memlinc to one of his most perfect, most enchantingly
wordly Saints.

She was tall and slender and her bearing was of an excep-
tional grace. Memlinc later painted her as Saint Barbara in
a dress of refined simplicity. The meticulously plucked eye-
brows and the very fashionable jeweled turban on her tightly
smoothed hair, shaved away at the temples and across the
forehead, accentuate the noble structure of an intelligent
and controlled countenance. Margaret was entirely woman
of the world of a world in which she was to play a great
role and to accept heavy responsibilities. But the shadows of
a disturbed and often tragic future did not yet darken this
first meeting with her stepdaughter in festively decorated
Sluis.

The first contact with her new country was like a lucky
omen. At a single glance Mary had shown herself won over
for good. The Dowager Duchess, who, being the daughter of
a princess of Lancaster, beheld in Margaret's triumphant ap-

20 The Pawn

pearance the glory of the House of York, knew how to hide
her feelings politely behind the courtesy of etiquette. A gala
dinner closed the important day. The Duke himself was
expected shortly.

From now on, the lives of these two women, Margaret
and Mary, circled like two planets round one and the same
radiant center. Charles was their star. His obstinate tyrant's
will was their law. They followed him, ruler over many
lands, on his wanderings from one to another of his various
residences. They appeared side by side at court festivities
and glorious entries, and the people of Bruges, of Ghent, of
Middelburg, ran out and stared with open mouths at the two
charming beauties: the Damoiselle of Burgundy, growing to
attractive maturity, and the young Duchess, who was said
and it seemed scarcely believable to be able now and then
to induce that most stiff-necked of Europe's princes, Duke
Charles, to change his mind. That was an achievement which
none of the courtiers, none of the Knights of the Golden
Fleece even, could rival. What Margaret did accomplish
now and then was a miracle. People whispered that it was
not her beauty through which she exercised her influence.
Charles was not susceptible to feminine charm. His lot had
been that of many a crown prince, of many a son, and he had
grownup in unconscious opposition to his father, Philip the
Good, the duke of innumerable mistresses, of countless bas-
tards. Amidst the elegant and voluptuous courtiers, who also
in matters of love followed eagerly the example of the old
Duke, Charles, Count of Charolais, lived in a morose asceti-
cism, to be explained by a passionate, often wounded attach-
ment to his mother and frequent outbursts of aversion to the
unbridled eroticism of his father. And by the time the Good

Archduchess of Austria 21

Philip had closed his eyes, after a life of popularity and fabu-
lous successes which he had himself once likened to a dream,
the personality of his son had become fixed and was scarcely
amenable any more to softening influences. To Philip, life
had meant a rare show, amid the pompous settings of a theat-
rical and hollow chivalry, which gave him as well as his
subjects a deep satisfaction. To his son it meant battle and
disruption, ambition never completely satisfied, hatred, re-
sentment, and cold loneliness.

Over against this man even Margaret's charm was power-
less. But no one understood as she did the art of breaking
down his resistance to everything that came from others.
By means of the fire of a highly effective eloquence it was
possible for her to press home to his powers of perception,
often clouded by sudden wrath, the conclusions of her lucid
brain.

Charles recognized her mastery. He was even grateful to
her, in his own brusque and silent way, for whatever she did
for him. The court even noted with surprise certain signs
of an awkward tenderness toward his Duchess, a tenderness
his daughter Mary had never been able to arouse. Margaret,
in the eyes of the courtiers, was a magician.

And yet how little even she accomplished! For Charles's
whole nature of an introverted and stubborn fanatic was
driven by a boundless greed and an even more boundless
hatred. Greed for fame for himself and for his family, hatred
for whosoever came in the way of his ambition, primarily
for the royal house of France; these were the passions that in
the son had taken the place of those much more human
desires which in the eyes of his contemporaries did honor
to the father. No unbounded eroticism gave direction to

22 The Pawn

Charles's life, but a craving for fame and power that verged
on madness. What his father had harvested was for him but
a beginning.

And yet the ducal crown of Burgundy, under which so
many lands were united, shone more brilliantly than those of
the French king and the German emperor, in name still liege
lords, in reality powerless competitors. The Franche-Comte
and the Duchy of Burgundy; Flanders, Artois, Rethel,
Nevers and Namur, Brabant and Limburg, Zeeland and
Hainaut; the cities on the Somme: Abbeville, Peronne,
Amiens; finally Luxemburg thus had the might of Bur-
gundy grown. Thanks to Philip's wise policy the Flemish
cities had been able to work in peace and earn treasure. The
Low Countries, haven of rest, prosperity, and order between
a torn France and an England which the bloody Red and
White Roses had made into a hell the Low Countries
rightly counted as an earthly paradise, a land of promise.

But this was not enough for Charles. It was not the welfare
of his subjects but his own glory for which he strove. The
crown he wore was to him a constant reminder of a former
subordinate position. He was vassal, if not in fact yet still
in name, to the French crown for one part of his possessions,
to the Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire for another.

French suzerainty was the sharpest thorn in his flesh, for
in Charles's youth the impoverished French king had always
been far less kingly than his own father, the Duke, head of
the glorious order of the Golden Fleece, into which the high-
est French nobility were well pleased to be received, as a
feudal demonstration against the aspirations of the common
liege lord. The Golden Fleece thus embraced the whole op-
position of the nobility, still powerful but already fossilizing

Archduchess of Austria 23

into rigid magnificence, against the rising kingship, which
surrounded itself not with showy decorum but with shrewd
men of law and able burghers. The court at which all the
threads of political intrigue converged, whither journeyed
embassies from temporal and ecclesiastical rulers if their
lordships did not trouble themselves to go in person this
court was not one of the sombre castles where the French
king was wont to stay, but the residence of the "grand duke",
the court of Burgundy,

So strong was the antithesis between Charles VII of France
and his first vassal, Philip the Good of Burgundy, that the
two successors to the two thrones, Louis and Charles, each
in opposition to his own father, sought in their turn support
from that father's adversary. Thus the Dauphin Louis, later
to be called the Eleventh, gentle and modest, courteous to-
ward the ladies, subservient toward the Duke, had slipped
into the court of his "Uncle of Burgundy"; had nested in
there and, grateful and polite, had begun to undermine the
surroundings of his good host. For while now, having fled
before the troops of his hated royal father, he was dependent
on Philip's protection, in time he was to succeed his father
and with that act to inherit also the enmity toward the power-
ful vassal at whose board he now sat, an ideal, modest guest,
and at the baptism of whose granddaughter Mary he gra-
ciously functioned as godfather. If the phrase "to govern is
to foresee" "gouverner, c'est prevoir" contains any truth,
the Dauphin Louis was born a good ruler. He foresaw. And
he saw reality.

Reality for him was not his "Uncle" Philip, his father's
rival. A little patience and no one knew better how to wait
than this Louis and Philip's throne would be occupied by

24t The

the young Count of Charolais, who now kept away from all
the brilliant court festivities in stern opposition. Not Philip,
but Charles, would become Louis' opponent. And during his
five-year stay at the court of Burgundy he had sufficient
opportunity to study his future enemy, to discover the weak
spots in the Burgundian power, by all appearances so strong,
to learn to know the intelligent collaborators of the Duke
and of the Count and, ever so quietly and unnoticeably, to
win them to himself. Louis had no need to regard his Bur-
gundian years as time lost. They were to bring him dividend
upon dividend.

To Charles, Louis' sojourn at his father's court was one
torture the more. For this Dauphin, upon whom his f eignedly
humble gratitude sat so well, was according to etiquette the
superior of the Duke himself; protocol decreed that the
Duchess kneel before him in the dust, and, while their son
met with the same marked bonhommie with which the
Dauphin charmed the entourage of his host, Charles never-
theless felt continually driven into the background by the
presence of his future suzerain. He avoided the court, re-
mained by preference in the Northern Netherlands. And by
so doing missed the unique opportunity of acquiring that
thorough understanding of his opponent through which he
would later have been the better able to combat him.

But perhaps it would have been of little use to him after
all if his vanity had allowed him to remain at the Dauphin's
side. It was never granted Charles the Bold to know reality.
What he saw was the world of his own dreams and wishes,
formed in his mind by reading the lives of classical heroes,
emotionally colored by his burning desire for glory. No
shriller contrast is imaginable than that between these two

Archduchess of Austria 25

rivals: Louis XI of France and the last of the Burgundians,
representatives of an arising and of a dying world, of modern
national kingship and of separatist, moldering feudalism. Of
this last world Charles was one of the last phenomena. Always
looking toward the past, with ideals and aims that fell outside
the possibilities of a growing nationalism, he was in no posi-
tion to see the present or to guess the future. Impelled by
the last spasms of an obsolescent conception of life along a
road that had no outlook, Charles was unarmed against the
Machiavellian arsenal of his formidable adversary. The most
modern artillery, the best-disciplined army was unable to
stave off the defeat with which a mercilessly approaching
future threatened dying feudalism. The Burgundian bom-
bardes were in the end to seem as powerless as the unbridled
passion with which Charles fought for a cause that was
doomed by time.

Compared with their French opponent, the second liege
lord of the Burgundian dukes, the Emperor of the Holy
Roman Empire, seemed far less threatening. For what, in the
eyes of the wealthy Burgundians, could be the prestige of a
poverty-stricken old potentate like Frederick III, whom the
wrangling Electors had selected because it seemed nobody
had anything to fear from him? No wonder that Philip
the Good, that Charles the Bold who to the fury of their
French suzerain called themselves dukes by the grace of
God shrugged their shoulders over the powerless preten-
sions of this Habsburger, who put on old clothes when it
rained. Of this Emperor, who could rattle no precious
"golden rider" coins in his pocket, and who comforted
himself with the tuneful sound of the mysterious vowels:
"AJEJ.O.U." "Austriae Est Imperare Omni Universo", or

2 6 The Pawn

"Alles Erdreich 1st Oesterreich Unterthan", "Austria shaU

rule the whole world".

The Imperial power had meaning only for lovers of an-
tiquities. The feudal prestige of the impoverished and con-
stantly skimping Frederick consisted merely of a quantity
of fine-sounding fictions with which not a single one of the
young powers wished to be bothered* What did the Italians
do, the Swiss, the Hanseatic cities, but laugh at this highest
authority? What could have inspired the princely Burgun-
dians with respect? Countless were the rulers in the sur-
rounding territories of the Empire who willfully went their
own political way.

And Frederick let them. He had other worries than the
emperorship. He had to establish a dynasty; he had a son who
ought to be married off as advantageously as possible. Power
Frederick had not, but he had time. His opponents could have
their way, it did not trouble him. "Arma gerant alii, tu, f elk
Austria, nube": let others bear arms, happy Austria need only
enter into matrimony. . . .

For meantime, while Louis XI, the "great spider of Eu-
rope", was spinning the inescapable web of his intrigues,
while Frederick III was waiting and growing old, the destiny
of Europe, the destiny of Burgundy, was being fulfilled. It
lay, in those days, in the spasmodic hands of Charles. Fasci-
nated by a vision that had already conjured up before his
father the possibility of new luster the kingship over a
great, rounded-off Burgundian realm Charles the Bold, as
if blinded by too strong a light, threw himself into a future
of glory. The kingship then over Brabant had once before
been the subject of discussion between the Emperor, who had
it to bestow, and Philip, But it had remained at that and the

Archduchess of Austria 27

sole effect had been psychological: Burgundy became ac-
customed to the idea of a royal crown. The vision changed.
Perhaps Charles's blind assault upon the future already had
another sparkling jewel as its aim. For the emperorship of
the Holy Roman Empire was not the hereditary possession
of a family line favored by God's grace. It rested on the knees
of lesser deities, the Electors, the real rulers over the enor-
mous, formless realm. The Emperor Frederick was old and
was anything impossible when one possessed the treasures
of Flanders, the best artillery in the world, an ambition that
knew no limits and could exercise no patience? Duke of
Burgundy, King of the Romans, Emperor of the Holy Ro-
man Empire what was the fata morgana that drew Charles
on, sleepless and haggard, until the repulse at Granson, the
defeat at Morat, up to the moment when, mortally wounded,
he crashed on the ice near Nancy? It is doubtful whether he
himself knew.

The greatest tragedy about Charles is surely this: that his
ambition had no future. The crown, whichever it was he
thought to conquer, was to add no lasting luster to his dy-
nasty's name. The mythical jewel that he, the lost knight,
saw hovering before his mind's eye, was never to adorn the
boyish head of any young Burgundian. For the ducal family
included, besides the Duchess Margaret of York, concerning
whose childlessness no complaint has come down to us, only
Madame Marie, last princess of Burgundy, heiress to all the
realm, to all the ruin of her father's existence. And this gentle
little duchess with her somewhat sleepy eyes would bring
with her the whole conglomeration of heterogeneous lands as
dowry for the bridegroom her father should select for her:
the French provinces with their vineyards and orchards,

2 g The Yawn

which in spring spread a mist of blossom over the hills; the
Flemish cities with their riches, their cliques, their disrupting
privileges; the Northern Netherlands, scarcely more than
morass, soggy peatbog, endless shallow broads, among which
a highly enterprising people was growing up that from sheer
poverty went forth to seek its fortune out upon the very
element that sought to drive it from its homes. All this and
much more was Mary's dowry. And no prince in Europe
who, to acquire it all, would not have competed for this bride.

Upon Charles rested the task of himself selecting the heir
who should take the place of the son never born to him.
And this choice, upon which was to depend the future of
the barely consolidated Burgundian realm, the future of
Europe too, must be made in cool consideration, with weigh-
ing of pros and cons. It had to be like the determining move
in a game of chess, the first and therefore the most thoroughly
considered of a sequence projected with strictest logic, the
ultimate result of which must be the winning of the game.
Here nothing was to be achieved by personal courage, noth-
ing by quick-tempered command of lordly authority. To
the taking of this extremely important decision gifts and qual-
ities were necessary which Charles did not possess: patience,
understanding of people, political genius. The last above all.
And it was just this talent, difficult to define more closely,
the mixture of reason and intuitive sensing of the future, that
Charles lacked.

But the Duchess Margaret of York possessed it. She was,
moreover, not hampered, like her husband, by aversion to
a decision which must set before his eyes with bitter clarity
the irrevocable end of his own glory and dominion. To
choose a young and vigorous prince as son-in-law and sue-

Archduchess of Austria 2$

cessor is a more difficult task than the christening of a new-
born heir, a weak, helpless, and appealing creature that seems
not at all dangerous in the eyes of an ambitious father, even
though if God wills it he will one day grow up to take
over the crown and the rule and the glory. A crown prince is
a gift from heaven. But the consort of a crown princess is
a usurper, is the future itself in its most inexorable form.

It was too much for Charles to make this irrevocable
choice, to whom to give his daughter Mary as wife, his realm
of Burgundy as prey. The possibilities were countless, and
their multiplicity in a way helped to conceal the fact that
Charles indeed was looking for a son-in-law, for a new ruler
over his lands, but would not, out of inner impotence could
not, designate him.

Philippe de Commines, who knew the Duke, was of opin-
ion that he did not even want a son of his own, who would
have compelled him to see his actual rival growing up under
his very eyes. Charles the Bold had made many plans, some-
times even simultaneous plans, for the marriage of Mary,
which no less than seven times led to her being affianced, but
to this unprotected crown princess, who would have treas-
ures to guard, he never granted a husband.

Mary had never expected of life either independence or
personal happiness. She knew herself, from her youth up, a
political pawn in the hands of her father. He was her god,
who had the disposal of her life. She feared his attacks of
rage, when in his dark face the fierce blue eyes lost all their
color, no less than the numbing cold that could emanate from
him when merely his displeasure was aroused. Without the
Duchess Margaret, without the two devoted, motherly ladies
in waiting, Madame de Commines et d'Halluin and Anne

^ The Pawn

de Salins, who were charged with her care and education,
Mary's life would have been a hopeless waiting for an un-
certain future. Above all, Margaret's affection was essential
to Mary. With her she sought refuge from the terrifying
moods of her father, in her she found a guardian of her fate
and a protectress when mourning and loneliness fell to her
lot. Until, once again thanks to Margaret's intervention,
there came the brief fulfillment of her marriage with the man
who was in so many respects the complete opposite of her
gruff, unloving father: Maximilian of Austria, the son of
Emperor Frederick III.

He was, oddly enough, not the last fiance intended for
Mary, but the first. When she was six years old already a
substantial age for the heiress to such costly possessions her
grandfather, Philip the Good, had for the first time consulted
with the House of Habsburg over her marriage with the
then four-year-old Maximilian. Five years later it was her
father who thought that the Emperor, by reason of an alli-
ance between his son and Mary, would incline to support
the Burgundian candidature for the imperial succession. Yet
Charles the Bold at that rime too expected more than was
possible. The Emperor refused, and once more Mary, now
twelve, was at her father's disposal for a further political
transaction. The French king's brother, who suddenly died
(by poison, rumor said), Nicolas of Calabria, the pretender
to the throne of Naples, and Philibert, Prince of Savoy, fol-
lowed each other in betrothal to poor rich Mary, until
Charles the Bold once again this time after his conquest
of the Duchy of Gelre (Gelderland) had fanned his desire
for fame to the verge of insanity turned to the aging
Frederick III to see whether he could now sell the hand of

Archduchess of Austria 31

his daughter against a royal crown for Burgundy. But the
Emperor, who had let himself be persuaded to a personal
meeting with the Duke, sought protection from the Burgun-
dian pretentions in scarcely imperial flight, leaving his guest
behind in possession of already acquired and now useless
royal insignia.

This humiliating incident was not advantageous to the
good understanding between the two fathers, and soon after
Charles had been forced to experience his first defeat by
the Swiss he agreed, without the promise of the kingly
crown, to the engagement between his daughter and Fred-
erick's son. Once more Mary's life was disposed of in obedi-
ence to motives that were not inspired by any personal pref-
erence, any human affection. Her father had taken and
perhaps this time again only temporarily a decision to
which she had to submit.

The month of May, 1476, covered the world with a haze
of young green. Mary wrote a correct letter to the youthful
Maximilian, sent him, from her riches, a diamond ring in
token of betrothal. Margaret of York was delighted over
the future of her foster-child, though she had herself often
worked for a marriage between Mary and her brother, the
Duke of Clarence. But Margaret had once met the fair Aus-
trian Archduke and had received a favorable impression of
him, and she saw the value for Burgundy of an alliance with
the Emperor's son, who indeed possessed neither wealth nor
power, yet was surrounded by something of the prestige
that still radiated from the imperial crown*

The mood of the Burgundian court, despite the absence
of the Duke and many of the nobles, was in this spring of
1476 for the first time in many years colored by optimism.

^ 2 The Pawn

But in the east, in Lorraine, at the hands of the Swiss
lancers, fate was being consummated with the speed and
the violence of a tornado. The Burgundian army defeated,
the famous artillery lost, the treasures Duke Charles had
taken with him costly vessels, velvet tents, noble armor
prey to the rustic enemy. This was the first news that pene-
trated to Burgundy, and it caused Duchess Margaret to reel
as on the brink of a precipice. Where was the Duke, in what
condition? It was not yet known, but his death was feared.
It seemed an impossibility, a too great calamity to some, to
many too great a blessing. One heard the truth but did not
accept it. The people dreaded his return. Was he not in hid-
ing? Was it not said that he had gone into a monastery, un-
dertaken a pilgrimage to Jerusalem? Were they really freed
from the Scourge?

Margaret and Mary, in Ghent, did not doubt. The Duke
was dead. The abyss had opened, the end of Burgundy, of
their whole world, loomed up before the eyes of the two
women, the one widowed and powerless, the other heiress
and a prisoner. For the burghers of Ghent were the first to
realize the truth; they sprang to action, to arms, they pressed
about the walls of the ducal palace where Margaret and
Mary, helpless and in tears, could no longer expect com-
fort from courtiers and councilors. The King of France,
Louis, the Spider of Plessis-les-Tours, had been waiting for
this event. The Duchy of Burgundy itself, a male fief, re-
verted to the French crown. It was occupied by the French
even before the King was certain of the death of Charles the
Bold. Louis' ambassadors and spies swarmed forth to take
over the.remaining Burgundian lands, to deprive the heiress
of her possession, to set her restive subjects against her, to

Archduchess of Austria 55

encourage revolt, and to see Mary herself handed over as
the bride of the eight-year-old Dauphin Charles.

It was Ghent primarily that had to help realize these plans.
Ghent, the wealth and the menace, the strength and at the
same time the weakness of the Burgundian realm, Ghent
with its always insurgent burghers, its inclination toward
separatism, its inability to see the welfare and future of
the Netherlands in the consolidation of all forces, which
Charles, after all, had also had as his life's aim. Ghent only
wanted its old rights back which Charles had nullified and
crushed underfoot. It knew the powerless duchesses were
within its walls and it demanded and obtained from Mary a
return to the past in the form of the "Grand Privilege of
Mary of Burgundy" from poor Mary, who gave it her
name but through it lost her sovereignty.

The people of Ghent knew the aim of the French king.
They hated Duke Charles' councilors, Hugonet and Hum-
bercourt above all These two were members of an embassy
that had gone seeking to enlist Louis' clemency for the
lonely Damoiselle of Burgundy. But they were at the same
time secret bearers of a letter in which Mary begged the
King to deal only with these two and not with the rest. Louis
XI, whose moment of revenge upon the glory of Burgundy
had come at last, forthwith betrayed Mary and her coun-
cilors to a new embassy, made up of Flemish burghers,
which had come to France to arrange the marriage of their
princess with the Dauphin.

Revolt was already growling in the streets of Ghent when
these burghers returned with the information that their mis-
tress, despite her promise, had sought to deal with the French
king behind the back of the States General. The Damoiselle

54 The Pawn

herself they could not touch, but Hugonet and Humber-
court, her instruments, were lost. The day of their execution
amid a populace howling for vengeance brought Mary the
greatest grief, the most violent emotion of which her placid
nature was capable. While she, the chief offender, was being
spared, her obedient friends were to be broken on the wheel,
dragged to the scaffold, lost beyond rescue. Distress, indig-
nation, and shame broke the chains in which an upbringing
of strict etiquette had bound Mary's spontaneity. She, who
had never before left the palace alone, who had seldom
stepped outdoors on foot, found the courage to go herself
and beg for the life of her councilors. Unattended, with-
out even Margaret, who had always watched over her, Mary
dashed out of the palace, sobbing, crying for mercy for her
two friends.

The astonishment of those who saw her, their compassion,
knew no bounds. The Princess herself, unprotected, in deep
mourning, her hands outstretched toward the raging people
who among the impulsive citizens of Ghent would not
have willingly died for her? They would readily have
granted her the life of the two men; here and there a cry
was heard that they should after all be spared. But the
Damoiselle, in her wretched anxiety, had already turned to
another group, had already vanished in the tumult that filled
the streets. Her pitying supporters forgot their short mo-
ment of compassion. Around her roared the furious people,
who had not seen or had not recognized Mary. Her heroic
deed f or such was this action of the young princess raised
in safe isolation had been in vain. The enemies of Hugonet
and Humbercourt, fearing lest Mary find once more the
courage of her despair, hastened the mock trial, the result of

Archduchess of Austria 35

which had already been predetermined. The heads of her
advisers fell. And the day after the verdict, on Good Friday
of that year so bitter for Mary, the executioners of her two
friends laid before her a declaration for her signature that
she had given her consent to what had happened. Mary
signed.

She was alone. They had taken her stepmother, Margaret,
from her. She was nineteen years old, and not educated to
command. She was surrounded by treachery, feared even
for her life. She had signed, and her heart broke because of
what they had done to her.

She learned from the people of Ghent that they loved her,
wanted to be true to her, intended to seek a good husband
for her. They still thought of the Dauphin Charles, a weird,
gaunt little boy of eight. But had not Mary's governess, the
kindhearted Madame de Commines, who could nevertheless
be cattish if something displeased her, on some earlier oc-
casion made the deprecating remark that the Damoiselle of
Burgundy needed not a child but a man, and then would
herself see to having children?

Mary's only hope was Maximilian. He was her betrothed.
He had her ring but he was far away, infinitely and unat-
tainably far away, hunting in the Tyrol perhaps, or watch-
ing the armorers in their workshops engraving the suits of
armor that he loved as a woman loves new clothes. How
could Mary, in Ghent, prisoner of her rebellious subjects,
call him to her side, the only person in whom she could still
trust, the prince, the knight, whose task it was to protect
the innocent?

She wrote. She managed to have her letter sent secretly
out of the palace, though it was surrounded by halberdiers.

2$ The Pawn

Margaret of York too, separated from Mary and waiting in
helpless rebelliousness in her palace at Malines, wrote to the
Habsburg court, begged for the coming of Maximilian, the
only person who could put an end to the desperate situation
in which the two, the Young Princess and the Old, found
themselves. And while Mary was more than ever surrounded
by suitors who vied for her hand Adolf of Gelre (Gelder-
land), Adolf van Ravestein, son of the Duke of Cleves, not
to mention the Dauphin Charles an embassy of princes and
churchmen journeyed to Flanders in the name of the Em-
peror to conclude by proxy the marriage of the Duchess of
Burgundy and the Archduke of Austria. The States gave
their assent and Mary could regard herself as united to
the young foreign prince and safe from the attempts of the
people of Ghent to give her hand and her lands away to an as-
pirant from whom they expected advantage to themselves*

After the violent emotions of this tragic spring of 1477
there now began for the young Burgundian Duchess a pe-
riod of tense anticipation. Her husband, Maximilian, was
poor, and far away. He must make a worthy entry into the
Netherlands, and without the wealth of Burgundy this was
not possible. His new subjects, accustomed to splendor and
show, their quick tongues ready enough to malign, must re-
ceive a good impression of their young prince. He must
come in brilliant company, for all to see that no expense had
been spared. The Emperor could not provide all this. There-
fore funds must be sent, and patience practiced, so that the
preparations might be carried out.

At last the day did break when the little Duchess was
able to receive in her audience chamber a wearied messen-
ger, white with dust, who announced to her that he had

Archduchess of Austria 37

seen with his own eyes the entry of her archducal spouse,
had heard with his own ears the joyous acclaim of her exu-
berant subjects. And shortly thereafter Mary, standing on
the steps of her palace, beside her stepmother, whose impres-
sive beauty took away the breath of the somewhat rustic
German knights, could greet as her lord and master, her
savior and her refuge, the young Archduke who was her
husband.

In body and mind Maximilian was cut out for the role that
fate, and Mary's imagination, had bestowed on him. He
looked like an archangel as at this stirring moment he
mounted the steps of the ducal palace in one of those mag-
nificent suits of armor, incised with most skillful art, that
even now are the pride of famous museums. His young
sportsman's figure was all riveted in silver, and over that
shining armor he wore a black velvet Burgundian cross, a
charming attention toward his bride. Maximilian was bare-
headed, like the knights who accompanied him, and on the
radiant blond hair that fell in a wave upon his shoulders he
wore a wreath of pearls and precious stones.

At this festive and dramatic moment of his life he was
utterly happy. He knew himself awaited as rescuer and lib-
erator by a helpless young woman who was already his wife.
He was eighteen. His heart beat high against his silver armor
as, followed by three knights, who like him wore the cross
of Burgundy in black velvet over their cuirasses, he mounted
the steps and raised his eyes to the two elegant women who
awaited him: Margaret, the Old Princess, still the more strik-
ing of the two duchesses, and Mary, his wife, for whom, be-
cause of her helplessness, he already felt a tender affection.
Maximilian, who all his life was to enjoy seeing himself as

2$ The

the eternal jeune premier in the tragi-comedy of his princely
existence, felt himself at this moment in the center of par-
ticularly flattering f ootlights. The stage setting was perfect,
the role as if written for him. And the jeune amour euse who
stepped forward to meet him and greeted him with a shy
kiss and a few words of French which he did not understand,
fitted perfectly into the ideal picture he had formed for
himself of this first meeting.

She was small and dainty and moved with a light grace
that was at the same time full of dignity. For Maximilian's
romantic and enthusiastic heart, love at first sight was a ques-
tion of a few moments. To his friend Priischenk he was later
to write full of tenderness about Mary's little face, her mouth
with the thick underlip that she was to pass on to the Habs-
burgs, about her snow-white complexion and her brown-
gray eyes with the slightly swollen Uds giving the impression
that she had just awakened. At the moment of their meeting
this little face looked radiantly up to him with such thankful,
shy adoration that Maximilian's delight blossomed forth like
an orchard in May sun. He was admired, he was indispen-
sable! Was this not sufficient to fall in love? Maximilian was
indeed in love. He was the happiest man in the world, Mary
was in his young eyes the most beautiful, the most adorable
of all women.

In a few moments his dream of happiness was being shared
by Mary. The young prince who was her husband and who
had come to free her from a critical situation, to support and
protect her for the rest of her life, was moreover a delight
to the eye. In his silver and black velvet he radiated youth
and the joy of living. His strong, very striking face with
the large aquiline nose, the prominent underlip, was not

Archduchess of Austria $$

handsome; but it showed a very lively personality, an un-
mistakable charm, and the large dark eyes lent it a warmth
that immediately melted Mary's carefully cultivated reserve.
Her heart overflowed with gratitude, admiration, emotion.
She too was in love. She was the happiest woman in the
world, the wife of the noblest, the bravest, the most attrac-
tive prince.

And so it remained for the few years during which these
two were to go through life together. That they did not
speak each other's language and could at first exchange only
their feelings and not their thoughts, scarcely hindered them
in their overwhelming happiness; on the contrary, it in-
creased the suspense, made their relationship ever more fasci-
nating. Mary taught Maximilian French, he taught her Ger-
man. They burst out laughing, like children, at each other's
mistakes. During the long evenings of their first winter they
read together the old romances, in which they recognized
their own love, their own happiness. But most of all they
enjoyed hunting, the favorite sport of both. Mary on horse-
back was at ease and tireless, radiant with courage and gaiety,
the ideal comrade of a born hunter like Maximilian. Both of
them loved animals. Mary's swift greyhound, which slept in
their room, was the pride of her young sportsman husband.
"If we had peace, we should be living in a garden of roses",
Maximilian wrote at this period of his life. But there was
never peace.

For though to Mary and Maximilian the experience of this
great happiness might now seem the ultimate goal of their
marriage, what had brought it about was something quite
different. The realm of Burgundy had to be kept from dis-
integrating and had to be defended against that formidable

40 The fawn

enemy, Louis XI, who, after the marriage of the Damoiselle,
laid off his fatherly mask and showed himself in his true
form. Not to love but to command was Maximilian's task.
And he took it on with the same youthful fire, the same
enthusiasm, with which throughout his life he always flung
himself upon anything new that appealed to his imagination.

The internal difficulties above all were overwhelming for
the eighteen-year-old foreigner that, after all, Maximilian
was. On coming to the Low Countries he had, it is true, been
greeted by the people with rejoicing and with eloquent
triumphal arches upon which one read that he was the true
ruler of Burgundy and must fight Burgundy's battle. His
heroic figure had made an impression and his winning smile
had been applauded. But when the first festive joy had died
down, there proved to be no place for the young prince con-
sort. One thing, however, was certain for his turbulent sub-
jects: the real sovereignty would have to rest not with this
inexperienced ruler, but with the burghers.

But first battle must be done against the arch-enemy Louis,
whose hordes were laying waste the Burgundian lands. Maxi-
milian, who seldom hesitated to translate plans into action,
put to use the now violently anti-French mood of his subjects
and called them to the national war against the French. He
raided the treasure chambers so carefully filled by Mary's
grandfather Philip, and sold valuables to the tune of a hun-
dred thousand guilders in order to have cash at his disposal.
The Flemish banking world had confidence in the young
fighter, of whose personal courage wonders were told, and
gave him credit, more necessary than a hero's heart. And
without asking the always recalcitrant States for subsidies,
Maximilian was able to make his preparations for the protec-

Archduchess of Austria 41

tion of those lands which he now looked upon as his own.

But Louis, who never fought if he could still achieve some-
thing by diplomacy and delay, broke the Burgundy enthusi-
asm by repeated armistices. Nevertheless Maximilian was
constantly in the field. Mary, in a thousand fears lest some-
thing happen to her recklessly brave husband, saw her hap-
piness continually threatened. Trembling for Maximilian,
she awaited her first confinement. And it was Margaret of
York, Madame la Grande, as they now called her, who, in
June of that year 1478, carried Mary's first-born, Prince
Philip, later to be surnamed the Handsome, to the baptismal
font. Burgundy and Austria had acquired an heir. Banners
and flags flapped in the summer wind, garlands and festoons
decorated the streets of all the proud cities, through which
thanksgiving processions wound, and the nights were red
with the sooty flames of torchlight parades. There were fes-
tivities in all the lands of Madame Marie.

The struggle with France dragged on. With more enthusi-
asm than ever Mary's subjects now flocked to the leadership
of the young Archduke, who was the father of a crown
prince, a new "natural ruler" over the realm of Burgundy.
One year after the birth of Philip, Maximilian defeated the
French army at Guinegate. But against Louis weapons were
always of little use. Alliances were more to the purpose. And
so Maximilian, who would have loved nothing better than
to pursue the enemies of his beloved Mary sword in hand,
saw himself obliged to take refuge in the political game of
intrigue and ruse, betrayal and deceit, in which Louis was
such an unsurpassed master. His policy became the traditional
Burgundian policy. He sought approach to everything in
France that opposed the absolutist king. He allied himself

42 The Pawn

with England, the natural opponent of France, strongly
supported in this move by Margaret of York, whose well-
tested policy was thus continued. The end had remained the
same: nor was it necessary to change the means. In July,
1478, a trade agreement was reached; a year later the be-
trothal was arranged of the year-old Archduke Philip and
Princess Anne of England.

Maximilian was to deal the French king one more severe
blow. The Duke of Brittany, once before united with Charles
the Bold against their common suzerain, now ranged himself
again on the side of Burgundy.

Maximilian's star stood high in the heavens. Fortune smiled
upon him. His love for Mary, her boundless devotion, the
warm affection of the Old Princess for the young couple,
the joy over the baby Philip, made of the domestic life of
the Austro-Burgundian family an idyl such as the children
of princes are seldom granted. When Maximilian returned
home after his victory at Guinegate a celebrated commander,
Mary was expecting her second child. On the loth of Janu-
ary, 1480, she gave birth to a daughter, who was baptized
in the cathedral of Sainte Gudule.

The newborn Archduchess of Austria was named Mar-
garet, after Madame la Grande.

Le tout va mal et sans loy est la terre,
Ou puissance tient le lieu de justice
Et ou le jour fait de la nuyt Toffice
Et le f uir tient lieu de bonne guerre.

Se vous voules ces trois ditz bien enquerre,
Vous trouveres que par tel malefice
Le tout va mal.

Mais on ne veult congnoistre que Ton erre,
Car pour vertus ung savoir d'aute lice
L'on exaulce et louhe Ton le vice,
Dont jurer puis, par monseigneur Saint Perre,
Le tout va mal.

All goes awry and lawless is the land,
Where power takes the place of justice
And where the day does office for the night
And men will flee instead of bravely fighting.

If you will well examine these three sayings,
You'll find it is by such maleficence
All goes awry.

Unwilling to acknowledge that we err,
We heed familiarity with licence
As if it were a virtue, praising vice,
So I can swear, by my lord Holy Father,
All goes awry.

CHAPTER TWO

of France

THE tenth of January, 1480, It was eleven o'clock in
the morning when the good news flew through the
halls and galleries of the ducal palace at Brussels of the happy
birth of a little Archduchess of Austria. Shortly thereafter
two messengers left the city to carry the joyful report to
Maximilian. They did not spare their horses, and they were
richly rewarded. The birth of a daughter was certainly of no
less importance to a princely dynasty than that of a son,
especially now that the succession was already assured*

The instant she came into the world the fate of the little
Margaret was determined, and courtiers and burghers made
no pretense of concealing the reasons for their delight. She
would be expected to make possible some strengthening
alliance for the dynasty "quelque bon renfort d'aliance
pour la Maison" as Margaret's historiographer, Jean Le-
maire de Beiges, candidly set it down.

For among princes, just as with farmers, children were a
help in the business. And daughters, docile and thoroughly
imbued with their sense of duty, offered more chance of ad-

45

4$ The Town

vantage than younger sons, who only too often inclined to
set themselves up as centers of dissatisfaction and rebellion
among nobles or burghers. Daughters offered exceptionally
good political material. It is not unlikely that Mary, holding
the baby girl in her arms for the first time, called to mind
the course of her own life and feared for a future upon
which she herself, a mere woman, would be able to exert so
little influence.

The baby was the pride of her young parents. She was
sound in health and perfectly formed, which increased her
future value considerably. To Margaret of York her little
godchild was a source of lasting joy. Her life had received a
new content that in a way made up for the loss of her own
position. She had already had several opportunities to con-
tract an advantageous second marriage. The Old Princess,
they called her but she was not yet thirty, and her beauty
and intelligence were praised far beyond the frontiers. Yet
she rejected every good match. Burgundy had become her
life's task. With the purposeful intelligence characteristic of
her she watched over the young family, gave indispensable
support to Mary during Maximilian's absences, and was, as
in the time of Charles the Bold, the real center of the Bur-
gundian court.

All Margaret's strength of mind and spirit was to be needed
sooner than anyone could have expected. The stars under
which the infant Margaret of Austria was born were to lead
her, later on, to adopt the device that said so much Fortune,
Infortune, Fortune . . . and now it was not long before
they made their disturbing influence felt.

In September, 1481, Mary had again given birth to a son,
who died soon after. It seemed that the sorrow over this loss

Queen of France 47

was never to leave her. She lived as if under a shadow and
suffered deeply from the anxiety that Maximilian's absence
during his French campaigns again and again caused her.
In vain did Margaret of York try to put some heart into her,
in vain did her advisers praise the military talent and the
ability Maximilian had always shown as a soldier. Each part-
ing was martyrdom for Mary, each reunion beclouded by
new fear. Each time she bravely fought against the depression
for which she could give the troubled Maximilian no single
reason. She had every cause to be happy: she was awaiting
her fourth child.

It was in 1482, on one of those unexpectedly mild spring
days among the bufferings of March, that Mary suggested
a plan for a hunting party, in the hope that sun and fresh
air might help her out of the inexplicable heaviness of spirit
that had now been torturing her for weeks. She was advised
against it: would she not, in view of her condition, be content
with a quiet ride? But she yearned for exercise, for danger,
for forgetf ulness. And they rode forth.

Mary, her falcon on her wrist, was followed by the ladies
of her court, while the Archduke, at the head of his nobles,
soon vanished from sight. The early spring morning was
fresh and exhilarating. The young Duchess breathed deeply,
enjoyed the rapid exercise, the swift flight of the birds of
chase, the stately sailing of the herons. The shadow seemed
to leave her, her voice sounded gaily over the awakening
countryside.

She urged her horse to greater speed, not to lose her hunt-
ing falcon from sight. A ditch caused her mount to hesitate.
Mary struck it with her open palm, it took fright, turned
suddenly. . . . The disaster had happened. The Duchess

jg The Pawn

was thrown against a tree, the horse went down, its crushing
weight falling full on Mary's body.

Seriously injured, bleeding heavily, she was picked up and
carried to Bruges. A prey to helpless modesty, she refused to
let herself be examined. She understood what her fate was to
be, and now in the days during which she slowly bled to
death she showed again the heroic courage that had once
driven her to fight for the lives of her councilors. She com-
forted Maximilian in his despair, said she believed in her
recovery. But whenever he left her chamber for a few mo-
ments, she wept in the arms of Margaret of York, wept for
her young life, her children, her love.

Pilgrimages were undertaken. Bareheaded, Maximilian
strode through the streets of Bruges in a penitential proces-
sion, followed by the whole court, by thousands of sorrow-
ing citizens. On his return he found Mary exhausted, but
smiling.

The Knights of the Golden Fleece, devoted followers of
the late Duke Charles, were called in. Weeping they stood
around the bed of the Duchess, while she besought them to
remain faithful to her husband and her children, to defend
her country and her subjects.

She begged forgiveness of God for the worldly life she
had led, of her friends for the sorrow she might have brought
upon them. She bade farewell to the knights, to the ladies
of her court, to Margaret, to her children ... to Maxi-
milian. She died on the 271*1 of March, 1482, at the age
of 25. She had been gentleness and docility itself. In the
lives of Margaret of York and Maximilian she left a void
that could not be filled. Her children had scarcely known
her.

Hospital of St. John, Bruges

Margaret of York, Detail representing St. Barbara from the
altarpiecc by Hans Mcmlinc.

Kaiser Friedrich Museum, Berlin

Charles the Bold, by Rogier van der Weyden.

Queen of France 49

There was one person whose joy over Mary's death knew
no bounds: Louis XI of France, who had held her at her
christening. It was the last of his many passive triumphs,
this death and its consequences. Himself on the edge of
the grave and trembling with the fear of death, persecuted
by rapidly repeated strokes that each time deprived him of
speech and that each time he managed to overcome, Louis
accepted the demise of the young Duchess as a gift from
Heaven. It prolonged his wavering life by a few months of
which he managed to make use in masterly fashion. Partially
paralyzed, hiding in the darkest room of Plessis-les-Tours
so that people should not be aware that he was dying and
hence fear him the less, Louis went on weaving at the fatal
web in which Burgundy was to be enmeshed to its destruc-
tion.

News reached him that the two children, Margaret and
Philip, were in the hands of the citizens of Ghent as instru-
ments of power over their father. With the young and in-
experienced Maximilian, who possessed scarcely any influ-
ence, he had no need to reckon. The bells that rang for
Mary's death announced to Louis the end of the Burgundy
he so hated. Ghent would now, as so often before, be his
willing tool.

And Ghent was ready. Forgotten the revulsion which, in
a flood of loyalty to Mary, it had felt for the French King.
Forgotten the triumphal arches with which it had welcomed
the Archduke of Austria as the true ruler over Flanders.
Ghent now thought only of the times when it had been
enslaved by Charles the Bold, -remembered only its hatred
of the house of Burgundy, despised Maximilian, the poor
foreigner, who had nothing else to offer than war against

jo The fawn

France and very dubious victories that would cost a great
deal of money. Louis' promises were much more attractive
to burghers and workmen. He spoke in clinking coin, and
they Imew his voice of old. His offer meant peace.

Thus Maximilian found himself after Mary's death in
circumstances that truly bordered on the desperate. The loss
of the woman who had been the joy of his life had simul-
taneously robbed him of the political position he had ac-
quired through his marriage. Mary had indeed signed a
will, three days before her death, by which she had appointed
her children heirs to her lands and possessions, and had named
Maximilian guardian, governor, and regent of the realm until
the majority of Philip, successor to the ducal throne. But
what should this hastily made will mean to the States of the
Burgundian provinces who had not been consulted in Mary's
decision, and who all too gladly and rightly saw in Maxi-
milian the successor to Duke Charles, the Scourge? Louis'
spies were sneaking around Flanders, scattering promises and
costly gifts. . . .

One month after the death of their "natural princess" the
States-General met in Ghent. They accepted the Archduke
of Austria as guardian and regent, although Flanders, more
rebellious than the other provinces, still deferred its judg-
ment. But the war with France was definitely ruled out. Wars
cost money, cost blood, the States argued. The people wanted
peace in order to work in quiet and security, to grow rich
and to enjoy life. What did the Flemings care about the
Duchy of Burgundy, since Charles's death in the hands of
the French? They could live without the Walloons, who
were probably quite content to belong once more to the
country whose language they spoke. The States had learned

Queen of France 57

that King Louis favored a very reasonable peace, that he
wished to do the little Archduchess Margaret the honor of a
marriage with Charles the Dauphin. Could Maximilian im-
agine a more illustrious and useful union for the small prin-
cess?

No matter how the Archduke pleaded that they should
leave him his daughter, that they should not hand her over
in exchange for a shameful peace which he, at the beginning
of a glorious military career, did not wish, the influence of
Flanders, and particularly of Ghent, was so strong that he
had to give in.

So, on the 23rd of December, 1482, at Arras, the peace
treaty between France and Burgundy was signed by which
the two-year-old Archduchess of Austria made her entrance
into history. She became the affianced bride of thirteen-
year-old Dauphin Charles, whom the burghers of Ghent had
chosen for her mother five years before, and who was now
obliged to break his engagement to a daughter of the King
of England. Margaret's dowry included Artois and the
Franche-Comte, the lands of Macon, Auxerre-en-Salins, Bar-
sur-Seine and Noyons, which instantly passed into the hands
of the French king. By this arrangement she gave up the right
to further demands she might have made on her mother's
inheritance. The treaty, so bitter for Maximilian, finally in-
cluded the condition that the little bride should be promptly
delivered over, in order that she might be brought up in her
future husband's country, far from her father and his anti-
French influence, to become a worthy queen of France. The
Bang on his part agreed that the Dauphin should wed the
little Archduchess as soon as she should have reached mar-
riageable age. The Grand Privilege, which had been wrung

p The fawn

from Mary after the death of her father and which meant
sentence of death upon the central authority of Burgundy,
was- with understandable satisfaction ratified by Louis.

A few weeks after the conclusion of the treaty the little
bride celebrated her third birthday. Deep mourning hung
over the court at Ghent. Margaret of York grieved at the
approaching separation from her godchild, who had some-
times made her forget for a moment the loss of Mary. Maxi-
milian, since the death of his wife more than ever a foreigner
in the Low Countries, was obliged to look on helplessly while
the last trace of authority was taken from him. In contradic-
tion to the decision of the States, who had recognized the
Archduke as governor and regent, a regency council was set
up for Philip, in which the strongest influence was exerted by
Ghent. As his two children had been taken hostage, the
young and battle-loving Maximilian was deprived of any
possibility of resistance against the decisions of his rebellious
subjects. Only the circumstance that the long journey in
winter might endanger the life of the little princess prevented
the burghers of Ghent from delivering her over immediately
to her grasping father-in-law.

While execution of the treaty thus dragged on in expecta-
tion of the mild spring weather that should make Margaret's
long journey possible, strange rumors began to circulate in
the Low Countries. Something was said to be wrong with
the marriage of "Madame Margaret". What were these
Ghent fellows up to? They had, so the whisper went round,
married off this daughter of Burgundy to a boy who did not
exist. Had anyone ever seen a French crown prince with his
own eyes? Was it not said that the hated and feared Louis
had never had a son of his own? This was a son, they declared,

Queen of France 53

of Louis' son-in-law, the Sieur de Beaujeu, to whom Margaret
had been given in marriage. Shame on the people of Ghent,
who had sold the reputation of Burgundy for their own
advantage! Protests and complaints rained down and in
Ghent itself suspicion raised its head.

To put an end to all these evil rumors an embassy set forth
from Ghent to France, to convince itself with its own eyes
of the existence of Dauphin Charles. At Amboise he was in
fact shown to these ambassadors. But their servants, fearing
to be deceived nevertheless, if they too had not kept them-
selves properly informed, raised a clamor outside the castle
gates, threatened to unmask the embassy on its return home,
demanded entrance to the castle where the ambassadorial
gentlemen were satisfying their own curiosity. The excited
noise penetrated to the rooms in which the governors of the
Dauphin were exhibiting their charge. And to remove all
doubt, they flung the portals wide and let servants and
grooms, fools and barbers, into the royal presence. Everyone
was satisfied, and to the pleasure and reassurance of his public
little Charles gave an exhibition of sharp-shooting, trotted
around to show that he was a strong and healthy boy, and
finally took off his little tabard of costly gold brocade, which,
with all appearance of frank spontaneity, he gave away to a
fool who had come in with the Flemish servants and who
carried it back with him in triumph to Flanders.

Without his coat Charles was even better to be seen, and
letters from eyewitnesses told admiringly of his sturdy
calves, calling him a fine beginning of a prince "ung tres
beau commencement de prince". . . . His three-year-old
bride might rest content.

After this experience the ambassadors journeyed to Tours,

24 The Pawn

where Bang Louis, his dying body enveloped in the luxurious
furs and satins he had disdained all his life, received the
gentlemen of Ghent in a castle defended by sharpshooters,
its iron gates guarded by bloodhounds. They found him in
a little prisonlike room, without light, so that they could
scarcely distinguish him. He spoke with difficulty, and only
a few words, apologized because his right hand, which he
carried in a sling, was somewhat weak. He took his oath
upon the treaty with his left hand.

The gentlemen from Ghent, who had quite a different
picture in their minds of the powerful French ruler, giver of
so many princely presents, were nevertheless most deeply
impressed by this scarcely visible deathly apparition. They
feared the pale, ghostly face. They did not know how to
show sufficiently their willingness to please. The King, who
would have been content if little Margaret had received
either Artois or the Franche-Comte as dowry, acquired both
through the largesse of the people of Ghent. This he greatly
prized. Their pockets full of gold, a princely tip, the ambas-
sadors returned to Flanders.

Toward the end of April, when the roads had become
passable for a slowly and carefully traveling train of car-
riages, the moment of parting came. To Margaret the tears
of her grandmother, who was so young, and the silence of
her usually so talkative ladies in waiting must have been
quite incomprehensible. Why should they be crying, while
she was being dressed as for some festivity? "Madame la
Dauphine", as she was now generally called, must make her
entry into France in worthy style. For this great journey
she wore a little black satin dress all embroidered in gold
thread, and a black velvet hat without a brim, over a white
muslin veil. A heavy pendant of pearls and large jewels made

Queen of France 55

this scarcely youthful toilette if possible still less childish.
The unknown artist who shortly before her departure
painted her in all this melancholy black, managed admirably
to set down in his rather stiff little portrait the tragedy of
these early years. From the pale infant face two dark eyes
look into the distance with a resignation that is just as un-
childish as the costly dress. The family trait of the Habs-
burgs is clearly to be recognized: the protruding chin that
both her grandfather Frederick III and her father Maximilian
possessed and that in Margaret was further accentuated by
the thick underlip which gave her such a strong resemblance
to her mother. The little nose is rather broad and plump and
gives rise to the suspicion that the prospective Queen of
France was to be no spectacular beauty. But the melancholy
little face with the striking eyes and the very pronounced
little mouth already bears all the characteristics of the per-
sonality that was later to develop.

The burghers of Ghent, who had sold the little Arch-
duchess, saw to it that she should be escorted by a strong
and brilliant cortege if only to be sure that Maximilian
would not attempt at the last moment to free his child by
force from the hands of those who were going to deliver
her over to the arch-enemy of Burgundy.

The coach, borne like a litter between two horses, in which
Margaret traveled sitting on the lap of her nurse, Jeanne
de Bousanton, was accompanied by her mother's cousin,
Adolph of Cleves, lord of Ravestein, and various Flemish
nobles who had chosen the side of Ghent and the French
king. After this escort followed no less than ten gilded car-
riages, carved with the proud amis of Burgundy and cano-
pied with cloth of gold. In these sat the ladies in waiting who

ft The Pawn

were to attend Madame la Dauphine on her journey. They
had spared no expense and vied with each other in fashion-
able toilettes and costly ornaments. After these covered car-
riages rode ten young noblewomen, mounted upon white
palfreys.

The brilliant procession moved laboriously over the rough
roads. Margaret and her nurse swayed with the motion of
the broad-backed Flemish horses. The ladies in their covered
carriages were jolted and flung about over holes and bumps.
It was a tiring expedition, and the ladies, though pleased and
flattered to have been selected for such an important mission,
complained to each other in their distress, shortening the time
by exchanging guesses as to how they were likely to be re-
ceived.

They traveled in easy stages, took three days to get from
Ghent to Lille, where a long halt was made because time must
be allowed for the French embassy, on its way to meet the
prospective crown princess, to reach the city of Hesdin,
where the solemn reception was to take place. After nearly
two weeks word came that all preparations had been made
and that Madame la Dauphine was awaited at Hesdin.

No less a personage than Bang Louis' daughter, Madame
Anne de Beaujeu, had gone with her husband to meet her
sister-in-law-to-be. Monseigneur de Beaujeu, with a brilliant
retinue and in the company of the municipal authorities of
the good city of Hesdin, received the Burgundian cavalcade
outside the gates and led the little Dauphine to the castle
where Anne de Beaujeu, surrounded by countless ladies,
awaited her. Excitement ran high in the slowly approaching
Burgundian carriages. Madame de Beaujeu, those occupants
who could see ahead noticed from afar, was wearing violet

Queen of France 57

satin, and the lining of her dress seemed to be cloth of gold.
The two noblewomen on either side of her were dressed like
twin sisters in black velvet lined with crimson. But the great-
est sensation were the brimless black hats these two ladies
wore and the very fashionable hanging curls that appeared
from under those hats. The Burgundian noblewomen, who
until this day had been happy with their hair shaved at the
temples, the style so flattering to the noble countenance of
Margaret of York, suddenly felt like country cousins. How
daring French fashions always were, really! Jealousy min-
gled with admiration in the hearts of the ladies from Flan-
ders.

They were now about to descend from their carriages, and
most of them just managed to catch a glimpse of how Mad-
ame de Beaujeu twice sank to her knees before the little
Dauphine, now the "first lady" of France, sitting upon her
nurse's arm. The nurse, utterly overcome to see the elegant
French princess kneeling at her feet, now also wished, though
she still had Margaret on her arm, to make a low curtsy. But
Monseigneur de Beaujeu prevented her from doing so with
a charming kindness that completely broke the ice of this
first meeting. The French ladies then embraced and kissed
the little Archduchess, spoke friendly words, exchanged
courtesies with the Burgundians. The entire company pres-
ently followed the Dauphine to the room that had been
prepared for her, and left her there alone with her nurse.

But Anne de Beaujeu still had a very important part of
her mission to fulfill. Together with her husband she went a
few days later to the apartments of the little Archduchess
and informed the Burgundian ladies in waiting that the King
had commanded her to assure herself that Madame la Dau-

S 8 The Pawn

phine would be a worthy daughter-in-law for His Majesty
even without the all-covering satin of her little dress of state.
Just as the gentlemen from Ghent had been able to see the
Dauphin without his tabard, Madame de Beaujeu and her
husband now gazed with great seriousness upon the little
princess undressed, "at which they were well content, being
greatly pleased in every way' 7 "dont fort se contenterent
et sy leur pleut grandement en toutes manieres" as Bresin
tells in his chronicles.

And now nothing further stood in the way of the offi-
cial engagement ceremony. The French and Burgundian
ambassadors met in the castle where Margaret was staying,
and they attended her "levee" in full state. When mass had
been read, everyone adjourned to the great hall, where the
Chancellor of Brabant, in the presence of the whole glittering
company, proceeded to give a thoroughly dull reading of the
endless marriage contract. Margaret, who attended this cere-
mony on the lap of her nurse, was thereupon solemnly con-
fided to the care of Monseigneur de Beaujeu, who, however,
at once returned her to the nurse. Herewith the official de-
livering over of the prospective crown princess had been
accomplished and the Flemish embassy had concluded their
important task. The knights and noble ladies were given to
understand that they could now return home with a clear
conscience.

"So that was all? " the Burgundian ladies asked themselves.
Was it for this cold and boring morning ceremony that they
had brought on this long journey their finest attire and their
most costly ornaments? Was this the far-famed French po-
liteness? Would these people dare be so rude as to let so many

Queen of France 59

distinguished personages depart without paying them the
attention of at least one evening festivity, at which they
might show off their jewels in the flattering light of candles
and torches? Did they really intend to dismiss the cream of
Burgundian court circles like a company of insignificant
lady's maids and governesses?

The indignation of Madame de Ravestein, Madame de
Gruuthuse, the many young noblewomen, knew no bounds.
The day of departure was set and not a single invitation
came to soothe ruffled feelings. Could one allow oneself to
be treated like this? There still was such a thing, the ladies
felt, as Burgundian pride.

They took revenge in their own way. On the morning of
their departure they all donned their most brilliant gowns,
put on the necklaces, the tiaras, the bracelets and earrings
they had so gaily brought along in their costly cases. And
went, attired as for the most elegant evening party, to take
their leave of Madame la Dauphine and of the mannerless
gentlemen and ladies of the French court. Like a company
of queens they entered the palace, and left it again immedi-
ately, too angry, too offended, to feel sad at having to take
leave of Madame Margaret. Thus, in their velvets and satins,
glittering with jewels the like of which the French noble-
women had never beheld, the Burgundian ladies stepped into
their covered carriages, mounted their white palfreys. Like
a fairy-tale cavalcade they left the city of Hesdin, stared
after by a few astonished burghers to whom chance had
granted this unexpected opportunity. A mile outside the city,
far from the staring eyes, the gaping mouths of those unman-
nerly French, the procession halted so that the ladies might

6o The Tawn

exchange their gala dresses for practical traveling clothes.
Pro-French they certainly had not become through this in-
cident.

After the departure of her indignant suite Margaret re-
mained behind in France among total strangers. Only her
nurse, Jeanne de Bousanton, was allowed to stay with her.
How did the child react to these shocks, to the tiring weeks
that followed, when she entered France in triumph? Did
they lay the foundation of the premature self-assurance, the
independence, the self-esteem, that were soon to characterize
her?

It was part of the dying Louis' propaganda campaign to
make the little Dauphine's journey through France into a
triumphal progress. Her prospective subjects, who disliked
the devastations of war as much as the burghers of the Low
Countries did, hailed her as the symbol of everlasting peace,
praised the King for his wise conduct of affairs, for the ex-
cellent intentions he seemed to have toward his people. Paris
was filled with the sound of festivities when "La Marguerite
des Marguerites" entered its gates on the second of June,
1483. Between the houses hung with tapestries and costly
fabrics, past squares where the guilds of the city exhibited
the most bizarre fantasy in their symbolic representations,
through streets filled with excited shouting crowds, the royal
litter went its way, swaying on the backs of the two finely
caparisoned horses.

Not much could be seen of the child only a few people
were able to relate how royal, how engaging she had looked.
But the procession was magnificent, the torches flickered in
the soft June evening. . . . There was peace. The Parisians

Queen of France 61

celebrated far into the night. Impressive and moving cere-
monies still awaited them. For the three-year-old Crown
Princess did as the queens of France were wont to do at their
coronation: from every Parisian guild one journeyman, per-
spiring with joy and emotion, was promoted to the rank of
master by Madame la Dauphine herself.

But these festivities and ceremonies were merely inci-
dental. The journey had to be continued, and on the zind
of June Margaret arrived with her French train at Amboise
and met at last her counterpart in the displays of which she
had so far been the center. Her prospective husband ful-
filled his role admirably, though his outward appearance did
little to help. The gentlemen from Ghent who had had the
privilege of viewing the Dauphin Charles had been so carried
away by the fact that a genuine crown prince really seemed
to exist that they had scarcely noticed how unattractive the
little fellow was. And Margaret had as yet no eye for the
appearance of her bridegroom: a thin, undergrown young-
ster with a hollow chest, crooked legs, and a head much too
big, dressed in crimson satin which further accentuated his
pallor.

The Dauphin made his reverent obeisance before his three-
year-old bride. But this first meeting could only be of short
duration, for he was in a hurry to put on a fitting costume for
the next scene. He was hastily brought to a house in the
neighborhood where he changed his red satin for a long
tabard of cloth of gold. Suitably attired for the real betrothal
ceremony, he proceeded to a place that had been roped off
for the occasion, where "Madame la Delphine" joined him a
little later.

Thus, in the open air, the children's betrothal took place.

fa The Pawn

The protonotary, in a loud voice that all could hear, asked
the Dauphin whether he wished to take Margaret of Austria
in marriage, to which he answered in the affirmative. After
which the little Archduchess was asked whether she desired
Charles the Dauphin as her husband. "Yes", came the child's
voice. Her hand was laid in his and Charles, aware of his new
dignity, bent down to the little girl who was willing to marry
him and kissed her twice.

It was not a long engagement. For on the very next day
the marriage was consecrated by the same cure who had
christened the Dauphin thirteen years before. The children
took the oath "as one does in marriage, for better or for
worse" "comme Ton fait en manage, c'est a savoir de non
changer pour pire ne meilleur". The Dauphin put a tiny ring
on the little hand that was held up to him. Margaret's first
marriage tie was tied.

Her French education could now begin.

Although much tragedy lay hidden in the fate that befell
the little fair girl from Flanders, it also had its brighter side.
In France she was in very good hands. Amboise, situated
among the rolling fields of Touraine, on the shining, many-
castled Loire, was assigned to her for her residence. The
people, who looked upon her as the symbol of a glorious
French victory and of peace, treated her with gentle respect.
The French court had nothing to fear from her, and even
less when, a few months after Margaret's wedding, Louis
XI died at last and his daughter Anne de Beaujeu assumed
the regency for her minor brother, now Charles VIII.

With Anne, who was twenty and according to her father
the least foolish woman in France "la moins f olle f emme de

Queen of France 63

France" the joy of life returned to the various royal resi-
dences from which it had been driven out by fear and sus-
picion during Louis' rule. The castle of Amboise, where the
Dauphin had lived like a prisoner, so withdrawn that rumors
of his nonexistence seemed plausible, now became the center
of a lively and elegant court life. Although "la petite Royne"
took no part in it, the atmosphere in which she spent these
first French years was bright and harmonious and of a warm
friendliness.

Anne de Beaujeu, energetic and intelligent, watched over
the so recently wrought unity of the kingdom, and over the
little Queen. She gave Margaret an excellent governess,
Madame de Segre, who cared for the lonely child like a
mother. In later years, when she herself was charged with
the upbringing of four motherless children, Margaret was
often to remember this warm-hearted, understanding woman
who had given her such a happy youth.

Though she was often called by the comfortable name of
"Mademoiselle de Flandre", Margaret's way of living yet
conformed entirely to her queenly dignity. Her court was
organized according to the strictest royal norms. Her Grand
Master was the Seigneur de Segre, the husband of her gov-
erness, and this functionary ruled over a numerous house-
hold. Twenty ladies in waiting, six lords in waiting, a Master
of the House, a treasurer, a doctor supported by an apothe-
cary, an almoner, a chaplain, two secretaries, and numerous
servants surrounded the little Queen with the routine of their
daily activity, prescribed by etiquette, and gave to her mode
of life the regularity that was so conducive to a balanced
physical and mental growth. Her nurse too was still there
to look after her, assisted in this task by two valets and two

64 The Pawn

chambermaids, a "lavendiere de corps", and two laundresses.
The table and kitchen personnel, the latter made up of expert
specialists, was highly impressive. Besides the six lords in
waiting whose duty it was two by two to pass the roast, the
bread, and the wine at Her Majesty's meals, it consisted of
two "chefs of the bread", three cellar masters with one aide,
three kitchen chefs and two cooks, two specialists for the
soup, one for the roast, three cook's boys, one "saulcier",
and an "aide de saulcerye". The French kitchen lived up to
its name; its servants at the castle of Amboise were many and
skilled.

The accounts of her treasurer, maitre Loys Ruze, which
because of her insufficient years were countersigned for
her by Madame de Segre "Premiere dame d'honneur de la
Royne, pour et au lieu de la dicte Dame, pour ce qu'elle n'est
en aage souffisant pour signer" give an idea of the various
amusements the little Queen was allowed to enjoy and which
she would pay for, often with her own hand and always in
gold. Many personages who for one reason or another con-
sidered themselves important or worth looking at or thought
they could contribute something to the royal pleasure visited
the miniature court at Amboise and were presented with
gold pieces: a dwarf came to show himself to the Queen and
a man who had been captured by the heathen; a female choir
came to sing a New Year's song; two children did contortion-
ist stunts; a priest came to preach; another contortionist, and
even a "gentleman" who understood this art, delighted Mar-
garet with their twists and turns.

When such extra performances were not to the fore,
Madame amused herself with her dolls, the expense of whose
dresses was also mentioned in the accounts. And then there

Queen of France 65

were the castle doves which she fed, the parrot that lived
in a large green cage and was perhaps the same "Green
Lover" "Amant vert" that was to keep her faithful com-
pany in later years.

There were also serious duties to be performed. On Whit-
Thursday in the year 1485 the five-year-old Queen washed
the feet of thirteen poor persons, who also received the gift
of a golden half-ducat each. In July of the same year the
court went to Tours to see the Passion plays, for which the
treasurer rented special grandstands. And on the occasion
of a visit of Madame's to Montrichard, beds were even hired
for the ladies in waiting from certain burghers of that city,
while the tapestries of Margaret's own room were taken
along in order that she should be surrounded by her accus-
tomed comfort even on a journey.

On all occasions Margaret appeared in dignified but very
tasteful clothes. With her red-gold hair and her milk-white
complexion, people liked to see her in black, and her ward-
robe included a choice of black satin, damask, and velvet
dresses, with which she wore little black velvet caps and in
winter a little coat of curly lambskin. To keep her completely
in style, even her ABC booklet had been covered with black
velvet. But on festive occasions she also wore gold brocade
and gold-brown satin, purple velvet and scarlet cloth. Kind
Madame de Segre chose the jewels for her foster-child with
much care and taste, and thus Berthelot Clabault, the gold-
smith, received the commission to make a golden belt for Her
Majesty, studded all over with her initials, M.M., in red and
white enamel. The gold used for this ornament was taken
from one of the heavy chains Margaret had brought along
from the Burgundiaft treasuries and which Madame de Segre,

66 The Pawn

with her elegant French taste, probably found too heavy and
too impersonal.

Yet the products of her native land were not altogether
despised. The little shirts and drawers, the knee-protectors
"gardegenoulx" the little caps and handkerchiefs that were
made for her were of the finest Holland linen. The little
Queen was not to be pitied. She lived in a beneficent climate
of warm sympathy and kindly care, in a milieu of refined
taste, in the midst of a typically French landscape, silver and
green under a limpid sky.

Her education was French, and therefore probably more
one-sided than if she had lived in Flanders, where her knowl-
edge of languages would certainly have received more
attention, where Madame la Grande would have taught her
English and Maximilian undoubtedly German, and where
Flemish would surely not have remained unknown to her.
These languages were now considered beneath the dignity
of a queen of France. But Madame de Segre, under the super-
vision of Anne de Beaujeu herself, did not fail to initiate her
into all the fine arts, those noble occupations which formed
and refined her taste, filling her with a passionate love for
beauty and harmony that was never to leave her, that was in
time to be a consolation to herself, an inspiration to countless
others.

So Margaret learned as a child the elements of drawing
and painting, industriously studied singing and the lute, be-
came familiar with the embroidery needle, learned with little
hopping steps the stately dances, the danses basses, that were
danced at the court balls. She was the Queen of France, and
now and then she received a visit from her husband, sur-
rounded like herself by courtiers and tutors. No shadow

Queen of France 6j

darkened these first years. She was a happy child, who had
scarcely any recollections of that other world in which she
had been born: rich and unruly Flanders, the ever traveling
court of Burgundy.

Although the little Flemish- Austrian princess dwelt at the
court of Amboise as a symbol of eternal peace, European
history did not stand still. Maximilian's innate resilience had
not forsaken him after the death of his wife, after the shame-
ful peace with France and the departure of little Margaret.
Nor had his subjects become any easier to deal with, and
the French nobility were as little as ever inclined to submit
to the monarchy, now that it was being represented merely
by a minor boy and a young woman of twenty. The treaty
of Arras, Margaret's marriage with the Dauphin Charles, had
been but a pause, a slowing down by which the stream of
history had only gathered more force, to rush on afterward
with greater speed.

In the death of his arch-enemy Louis, Maximilian saw the
chance for revenge he so burningly craved. He immediately
gave rein to his optimistic love of action. An ambassador
went to Charles VIII to protest against the peace concluded
at Arras; with Ferdinand the Catholic of Aragon, with Eng-
land, new relations were initiated, aimed against France. And
in complete accord with the former anti-French policy,
which he had taken over together with the lands of Burgundy
from his father-in-law, Charles the Bold, Maximilian sought
anew a rapprochement with the Duke of Brittany, last of the
great French vassals, who up to now had managed to escape
Louis' policy of centralization. The blow France had dealt
him through the marriage of his daughter Maximilian now

68 The Pawn

sought to counter by means of the same weapon: he sued for
the hand of Anne, daughter and heiress of Francis, Duke of
Brittany.

At home too Maximilian took his measures. The burghers
of Ghent still had the little Archduke Philip in their hands
and thought to control the Regent of Burgundy through
this instrument of power. But the other provinces were re-
volting against the dictatorship of Flanders; they supported
Maximilian, and civil war against rebellious Ghent became a
fact.

And not against Ghent alone. For Ghent, as of old, called
upon the French King, who, as worthy successor to his
father, declared that he would maintain with all his power
the rights of his "brother" Philip that were being threatened
by Maximilian. He even made an alliance with his little
brother-in-law, behind whose childish person Ghent's sepa-
ratist endeavor ran riot. But Charles did not lend much sup-
port. The Flemings saw themselves threatened by the Ger-
man soldiers Maximilian had taken into his service. One by
one the rebel cities, their military capacities no longer abreast
of the times, fell before the excellent professional troops with
their modern equipment. Ghent too was obliged to open its
gates, with all the consequences of that act.

Once more it lost all the privileges it had won back since
the death of Charles the Bold. And at the same time it lost
the most powerful privilege it had possessed: Archduke
Philip was removed from the city and transferred to Malines.

Peace now reigned at last in the Low Countries, an out-
ward but no inward peace. Now that his guardianship over
his son was recognized, Maximilian was free to follow up
his own interests, which lay no less close to his heart. Was

Queen of France 6p

he not in the first place Archduke of Austria, only son of
the Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire? The succession
to Frederick III had to be settled, and so Maximilian left for
Germany in November, 1485. He traveled in more than
princely style, and his train included among others a carefully
selected choir, whose members wore long vermilion tabards
lined in different colors according to the parts they sang,
tenor, baritone, or bass. What an impression this choir must
have made on the musical German princes, who would be
obliged to choose Maximilian as successor to the old Em-
peror! It was an exceptionally good piece of propaganda,
as were also the touching scenes enacted in order to make
the meeting between father and son into an advertisement
for the succession.

Maximilian achieved his purpose. In February, 1486, he
was in fact chosen King of the Romans, successor to Emperor
Frederick III. In April his dedication followed and his coro-
nation, by three archbishops, with the ancient German im-
perial crown. Radiant with new dignity, Maximilian, now
bearer of a royal tide, returned to his Burgundian lands.

After this he had no other aim than vengeance against
France, power for himself. What purpose could the wealthy
lands of Burgundy better serve than that of strengthening
the prestige of the House of Austria during the minority of
their natural prince, Archduke Philip? The war between
France and Burgundy broke out anew. After a few victories
for Maximilian the struggle swept northward again. The
French were now gaining the upper hand. Flanders' aversion
to the foreigner who had broken the precious peace of Arras,
who was furthermore losing the war, taxing them more
heavily than Charles the Bold had ever done, and whose

jo The fawn

troops were looting the countryside as though it were enemy
territory, increased every day. In Ghent indignation flared
up again. The last defeat was forgotten, the rebellious guilds
took control and the city acted in accordance with the rights
the Grand Privilege had given it: it called the States of Bra-
bant and Hainaut to a meeting within its walls.

True, these bodies did not respond; but the voice of Ghent
penetrated to the ears of the French king, always ready to
support the rebel subjects of Burgundy. Not Louis XI now,
but Charles VIII took their part, granted them special rights.
Once more Ghent and France stood together against the
Regent of Burgundy. Maximilian, confident in his new royal
dignity, confident above all in his excellent troops, did not
hesitate to proceed to action. He convened the States General
at Bruges, counting upon their support, and himself arrived
in that city with a small bodyguard a few days before the
meeting.

And then the little people, the carpenters and masons, the
smiths and potters of Bruges, attempted for the last time to
establish the authority of the burghers over that of the ruler.
Maximilian was inside the walls of the murmuring city, his
troops were still outside. The burghers closed the gates, re-
fusing to his soldiery the entry which Maximilian demanded
in person. The people sprang to arms, brought up guns,
transformed the market into an armed camp. They scarcely
took in the circumstance that they had the King of the
Romans, the prospective Emperor of the Holy Roman Em-
pire, the Regent of Burgundy, in their power.

Taking refuge in a spice shop on the market place, Maxi-
milian realized that he was the prisoner of his subjects, who
did not know what to do with their prey. But they began

Queen of France ji

by treating him to a series of executions, carried out in the
market square under his very windows. City magistrates,
merchants, officials and councilors of the Regent it was all
one. The people wanted to see torture and blood, to take
revenge, to make their power felt in a blind rage.

Who was responsible for the fact that the trade of Bruges,
once so flourishing, was dying out? That the great foreign
merchants who had brought treasures to the city were
moving their offices to Antwerp? That the inhabitants of
Bruges were diminishing in number, her craftsmen could
scarcely earn their bread, her houses were standing empty?
The central Burgundian government. And the torture rack
was dragged to the market square so that everyone could
enjoy the cries of the victims. Under Maximilian's windows
the blood-drunk masses howled with excitement.

From the windows of the castle at Amboise the little Bur-
gundian Queen of France looked out upon the bright re-
flections of the Loire, the wintry fields of Touraine. No
rumor of revolt and cruelty penetrated to her. And though
her entourage did learn the disturbing news that a future
emperor was in the hands of those who should kneel before
him in the dust, Margaret's peace was not in any way trou-
bled.

But to the Emperor Frederick, to the Empire, came reports
that the recently elected King of the Romans was being held
prisoner by the populace of Bruges, that his councilors were
being tortured and murdered, even that his life was en-
dangered. The Emperor himself moved up with an army
to release his son, the Archbishop of Cologne threatened to

12 The Pawn

excommunicate the rebels, the entire apparatus of temporal
and spiritual power was set in motion to persuade Bruges
to let her precious prey go free. The people of Bruges had
also to defend their prisoner against their co-rebels of Ghent,
who demanded that Maximilian be turned over to them.
They refused to deliver up the Regent, but they could not
prevent Ghent's once more taking the leadership into its own
hands. Ghent dictated the conditions of Maximilian's libera-
tion, and just as Mary had done in 1477, her husband now
did. While the German army was already approaching that
should set him free, he accepted in mortal fear the demands
of his subjects and betook himself, pale and thin after months
of anxiety and humiliation, to the same spot where he had
seen his councilors brought to their death, and where now,
on a platform decorated with tapestries and greenery, an
altar had been erected, a "triumphant siege pour le roy" set
up. Maximilian granted forgiveness to the rebels, knelt down
before the altar and swore to the pact, which included a
restoration of Mary's Grand Privilege, robbed him of the
regency over Flanders, and obligated him to remove his
troops within four days from the province and within eight
days from the other provinces. He paid 25,000 pounds Flem-
ish as remuneration for the hirelings who would have to drive
his soldiery out by force if they did not depart voluntarily*
Philip of Cleves, lord of Ravestein, was to remain behind
as a hostage in the hands of Ghent and to consider himself
released from his obligations to Maximilian should the latter
break his oath. . . .

Eight days later the released prisoner reached the army
of his father the Emperor. The tension, the mortal jeopardy
of the last months were forgotten. Here were the lansque-

Queen of France 7$

nets, the German knights, the Emperor himself, indignant
over the humiliation to which the King of the Romans had
been subjected. Here was the chance to take revenge upon
the rebels who had so deeply offended him. For Maximilian
the future was always more important, always more real than
the past, sacred though the oath might be that he had sworn
in that past. Possibilities interested him more than facts, il-
lusions more than experience. As Regent of Burgundy he had
sworn to this peace; as King of the Romans he was bound to
obey the command of his Emperor to move against Ghent.
And he solemnly declared to his hostage, Philip of Cleves,
that this fight had nothing to do with the peace concluded
at Bruges.

Once again there was war in Flanders. Maximilian's hos-
tage took upon himself the leadership of the people of Ghent
and announced his readiness to fight for the young Archduke
Philip against Maximilian, for the national House of Bur-
gundy against the foreign House of Austria. All in the Low
Countries who were averse to the centralizing authority of
their sovereign lords joined with Philip of Cleves, who under
the ironic cry of "Vive Bourgogne! "was determined to drive
Maximilian the foreigner, with his German soldiers, off the
scene. On the help of France, of Archduke Philip's brother-
in-law, he could count. The German army, which had moved
up in order to liberate a prisoner who meantime had bought
his own release, had because of this lost much of its desire
to fight. It got thoroughly bored before the walls of Ghent,
petered out, slunk away. The Emperor himself returned to
the Empire, Maximilian followed him three months later.
He left behind his formidable field marshal, Albrecht of
Saxony, to find a solution for the chaos in the Low Countries.

74 The Pawn

For new plans were occupying the King of the Romans,
Arma gerant alii, tu,felix Austria, nube. . . .

If battles brought no success Maximilian could always
move along other roads to reach his goal, the humiliation of
France. For while the struggle of revolting subjects against
their ruler had been raging in Flanders, events had been tak-
ing place in France that were to prove of international sig-
nificance. The last independent French duke, Francis II of
Brittany, had died without male issue and was succeeded by
his daughter Anne, for whose hand Maximilian had already
been suing. Here again was a hereditary princess waiting for
a protector; again Maximilian felt himself called upon to
hasten to the help of a young archduchess, an impressive
dukedom.

Anne of Brittany, aged thirteen, accepted him. But her
bridegroom had not limited his plans to the peaceful con-
quest of Brittany. When Anne had given her consent, he
remained in the neighborhood of Vienna, involved in one of
the endless wars that seemed to be indispensable to him, this
time against the Hungarians. His union with the daughter
and heiress of Brittany had to be carried out by proxy, just
as had been the case with his marriage to Mary of Burgundy.
Anne, too, he had never seen when, separated from him by
the whole of Europe, she became his wife. He did not know
her sad, distressingly ugly little face, her pathetic little figure,
which, shy and slightly lame, one would have expected to
meet in the sculleries of the ducal palace rather than on the
ducal throne itself. But the Duchess of Brittany knew what
she wanted. Immediately upon her unreal marriage she as-
sumed the glorious tide of Reine des Remains Queen of the

Queen of France 75

Romans. And thought she had secured the safety of her
country.

But she had reckoned without that other Anne, the Regent
and least foolish woman of France, Madame de Beaujeu, the
true image in all things of her father "vray image en tout
du bon roy Loys son pere" who knew only too well how
the good Kong Louis would have acted under these circum-
stances. Brittany must not be lost to the French crown. The
House of Austria must not ensconce itself in one of the most
important regions of France. There was but one way: to
undo the marriage of Anne de Bretagne. There was but one
new candidate for marriage: the young French king himself.
And all this despite Charles's "marriage" with little Margaret,
Mademoiselle de Flandre, despite Anne's "marriage" with
Maximilian, Margaret's father. A remarkable "changez vos
dames" had to take place, which could certainly not be
realized without force. But Anne de Beaujeu knew what she
had to do.

A French army marched on the Breton country. Charles
VIII himself took command of the military expedition.

The preparations for this first campaign of her husband's
could not escape the notice of "la petite Royne". Quick
tongues did not fail to betray to her, this girl of eleven, what
lay hidden behind the show of war that this time had come
to disturb the quiet life at Amboise. And when the young
King came to take his leave, Margaret confessed in tears
what they had told her: that he was bound for Brittany to
marry another woman "qu'il s'en aloit en Bretagne espouser
une aultre f emme".

Charles comforted her. His father had given him Margaret

jt The Pawn

to wife, said he, and as long as she lived he would take no
other. He embraced and kissed her. Charles had a kind heart
and he was fond of the little girl, upon whom he had now
looked for so many years as his queen. When she besought
him to take her with him to Brittany, since he had no inten-
tion of marrying anyone else, he thought it a good plan.
Margaret traveled with him to Montils-les-Tours. But
Charles' advisers considered that under the circumstances
this conjugal affection was going too far. Charles saw the
point, that his personal inclination had nothing to do with
the safety of France. . . . And the little Queen remained
behind.

Brittany was defenseless against the approaching troops,
and Duchess Anne, Queen of the Romans, at the mercy of
the French, was faced with a painful choice: to keep her
duchy and marry Charles VIII, or else to follow her still
unknown husband and leave Brittany for good. She would
be able to keep the royal tide she had taken on with so much
satisfaction. And "Reine de France" must have sounded more
impressive than "Reine des Remains" in the ears of a French-
woman, to whom the Romans were a very vague conception
indeed and who could have no picture whatever in her mind
of the German Empire that loomed behind Maximilian's title.
Anne chose her duchy and the new title, so much more com-
prehensible. Her marriage with Charles took place on the
6th of December, 149 1 , three weeks after the last Breton city
to protect her had fallen.

This act robbed Maximilian of Austria of his wife, his
daughter Margaret of her husband. The work of Louis XI
was done.

C'est pour james q'un regret me demeure
Qui sans seser, nuit et jour, a tout eure,
Tant me tourmante que bien voudroie mourir,
Car ma vie n'est fors seullemant languir,
Et sy faudra a la fin que 3 'an meure.

De rinfortune pansoie estre bien seure
Quan le regret maudit ou je demeure
Me coury sus pour me fere mourir,
Car ma vie n'est fors seullemant languir,
Et sy faudra a la fin que 3 'an meure:
C'est pour james.

For ever there remains with me one longing-,
Ceaselessly, day and night, at every hour,
Tormenting me so I would gladly die,
For my life is nothing but a pining,
And in the end 1*11 have to die of it.

I thought myself quite sure against misfortune
When that accursed longing in which I dwell
Overtook me, intent that I should die,
For my life is nothing but a pining,
And in the end 1*11 have to die of it:
For ever.

CHAPTER THREE

Crown Princess of Spin

TJORTUNE, INFORTUNE It was the first turn

JL of the inexorable wheel, and it robbed Margaret of the
crown of France and made her an outcast, she who for years
had lived the privileged life of a queen.

The child experienced her degradation as a whiplash, as
a shame and a humiliation, against which her self-respect,
cultivated in the surroundings of royalty, rose in bitterest
revolt. For the first time the power of treachery and deceit
invaded her consciousness, and it engraved upon her nature
a motif of cynicism which, softened by the influence of time
and of a beneficent humor, was to become one of her most
attractive characteristics.

She had for some time been feeling the approach of the
changes that threatened her. Charles's good-natured assur-
ance that since she was his wife he would marry no one else
had, it is true, at first set her mind at rest. But when he had
had to leave her behind and had set out toward Brittany, the
same suspicion, caught by sharp childish ears from whispered
conversations, returned again and again and quickly became

79

So The Pawn

a certainty. The gay and untroubled entourage of the little.
Queen had more to fear than she herself from a reversal in
Charles's marriage policy. They had lived in the castle of
Amboise as in a miniature garden of Eden, the ladies and
gentlemen of Margaret's court, and now they could not hide
their anxiety over a future that became increasingly uncer-
tain as the rumbling artillery of Charles's army drew closer
to the bastions of the Breton cities. It was these poorly de-
fended walls that must protect them against the changes of
fate. The tensions, the nervous forebodings of her courtiers
communicated themselves to Margaret. They oppressed her
in her sleep, and the story of one of her dreams has come
down to us, which, though it belongs in the realm of anec-
dote, bears the mark of authenticity.

She found herself in the midst of a park, Margaret
dreamed, and had been charged with watching over a little
daisy that grew there. Suddenly there came a donkey "une
asne" which tried in various ways to reach the flower in
order to eat it up. Haunted by fear, Margaret sought to
drive the creature away but she did not succeed. The
flower was eaten. Margaret was so upset by this that she
woke with a start, and all the following day felt herself op-
pressed as by a heavy burden. Did Madame de Segre recog-
nize in this dream of her young charge the symbolism for
something she already knew with certainty: that "Anne"
of Brittany would drive the little Flemish Margriet (daisy)
out of the garden of France?

When the definitive report reached through to Amboise,
Margaret realized the full extent of the disaster that had
befallen her. Everything familiar, everything she knew and
loved, she must now leave. In tears she poured out her trou-

Hojbibliothek, Vienna

Mary of Burgundy. Miniature from the prayer book of her father,
Charles the Bold,

Gfmaldf Gakrlf, Vienn

Emperor Maximilian I, by Albrecht Diirer.

Crown Princess of Spain 81

bles to her faithful governess. She did not want to go back
to Flanders, "et avait regret au roy Charles". And Madame
de Segre said wise words of comfort to this eleven-year-old
girl, of the kind that when they are spoken are not believed:
"Madame, vous ne devez ennuyer; vous estes fille d'un grant
roy et soeur d'un grant prince; vous ne pouvez faillir d'estre
une grant princesse; puisque vous n'avez peu avoir le Roy,
vous en aurez ung aultre" she should not fret; daughter of
a great king, sister of a great prince, she could not fail to be
a great princess; since she could not have this king, she should
have another.

There seemed to be nothing more now to keep Margaret
in France. But while Charles VIII had been glad enough to
marry Anne of Brittany, who thus delivered over the last
French duchy to the French crown, he was less inclined to
part with the earldoms his first little wife had brought with
her at their marriage. Under present circumstances Margaret
could indeed no longer remain at the royal residence of
Amboise, but neither could she leave France. Accompanied
by Madame de Segre and a still royal suite, she moved to
Melun to await the decision of her fate. What solution could
Charles find for the problem of acquiring the new dowry
without losing the old? Should he actually follow the advice
of an old councilor of Louis XI, never to give back "fille ne
fillette, ville ne villette"? Mademoiselle de Flandre was the
prisoner of her own dowry.

But new plans, new conquests were demanding the atten-
tion of Charles, who yearned for knightly honors. Italy had
called him, the eternal temptation of everyone who lived
beyond the Alps. France had been consolidated, but the
royal French crown would acquire greater glory if Charles'

g2 The Pawn

claims on Naples could be realized, which he had taken over,
by singularly roundabout ways, from the House of Anjou.
If the King wanted to go South with his army, then there
must be peace in the North, peace with Maximilian, the
robbed husband, the offended father, wfo>at various meet-
ings of the Diet had been using his most convincing eloquence
to persuade the imperial princes to an expedition of revenge
against France. Theoretical support Maximilian found in
plenty, in Burgundy as well as in the Empire. Legend had
swiftly got hold of the events in France, and in the German
Empire the rumor that Anne of Brittany, on her way to
Maximilian, had been forcibly carried off by Charles VIII
aroused particular indignation. The Pope, who had to grant
dispensation for Charles's sudden marriage, also believed in
the possibility of abduction; at any rate, he had the new
Queen of France declare that her marriage had her own com-
plete consent.

Poets made propaganda for the scorned King of the Ro-
mans. But Maximilian could not destroy French cities with
their indignant verses. And the German arms were slow to
set in motion for a cause that was of small importance to the
Empire, They were not going to excite themselves over an
insult that in fact had been addressed to the marital honor
of the House of Habsburg and not to the imperial dignity.
Only Maximilian's hereditary Austrian lands bore the ex-
pense of some hired German and Swiss troops that actually
occupied a few towns in the French Alps.

The Italian adventure tempted Charles VIII with un-
diminished force. The peace in the North was worth a few
sacrifices to him. And thus in May, 1493, the Treaty of Senlis
came into being, which meant the release of Mademoiselle

Crown Princess of Spain 83

de Flandre from her painful position in France. Her dowry,
and even more, was given back to her father. Maximilian on
his side was merely obliged to part with the title of "Duke
of Brittany", which he had flourished since his paper mar-
riage with Anne.

Once again young Margaret journeyed through France as
the symbol of peace concluded but now the carriages of
her suite rolled toward the north. Though she had wept at
first at having to leave France, the news that she could go
was nevertheless a relief. After the harmonious years of
Amboise, where she had been the center of royal honors and
of warm affection, her sojourn at Melun had been a good
deal like captivity. So great was the contrast that she sought
the help of Anne de Beaujeu, who had received her in France
and whom through the years she had called "Madame ma
bonne tante". It is the first letter of Margaret's that has been
preserved, short and clear, a touching expression of youthful
determination. If one compares it with the vague and blurred
epistles Maximilian used to write, Margaret in her twelfth
year appears to have far surpassed her father in capacity for
expression and in conciseness of style. King Charles now even
wanted, she complained to Anne de Beaujeu, to rob her of
a girl friend "qui est tout le passetemps que j'ay, et quand
je 1'auray perdue, je ne scay plus que je ferais" "all the
pastime I have, and when I have lost her I don't know what
I shaU do".

Did her cry of despair help? We do not know. Margaret
must have had to console herself over the bitter moments,
so numerous at this period of her life, which from time to
time caused her to find acrid words of irony, as little child-
like as the black velvet and brocade with which fifteenth-

#4 The Pawn

century fashion emphasized her royal dignity. It was upon
her return journey to Flanders, on being offered a wine of
honor that was sour in consequence of a bad harvest, that
Margaret with ironic politeness toward her former subjects
made a cutting play on words in which she compared the
oath (serment) of the King to the grapevines (sarment),
both of which had this year proved to be worthless. And
when at her entry into Valenciennes, festive despite every-
thing, the populace did not withhold its sympathy for the
attractive blonde girl whom for years it had regarded as its
queen, and greeted her joyfully with the selfsame cry of
"Noel, Noel!" that had so often rung in her ears, then Mar-
garet's rising bitterness found vent in the sharp comment,
through which echoed the familiar pride of Burgundy: "Ne
criez pas Noel, mais bien Vive Bourgogne!"

Vive Bourgogne! Soon this cry that had come back to her
in a moment of irony would rise to meet her in cities and
towns. On the i2th of June, 1493, ten years after she had
been solemnly handed over at Hesdin to the representatives
of France, Mademoiselle de Flandre was delivered by a bril-
liant French embassy of temporal and spiritual princes to the
ambassadors of her father. In Cambrai she was awaited by
her grandmother, Margaret of York, who saw the pale child
whom the burghers of Ghent had led away ten years ago
returning as a very well-brought-up, very elegant, witty
young girl. The ten years during which she had looked upon
the world from the throne of a queen of France had left their
traces upon Margaret, and Madame la Grande rejoiced in
the grace and sweetness, the dignity and the brave self-
control with which her grandchild at parting with her faith-

Crown Princess of Spain 8$

ful French courtiers handed them the presents she had
chosen for them.

Especially Madame de Segre, who had never left her side
in all these years, had been magnificently remembered: she
received a gold dinner service from Margaret's hands. But
it gave her no joy, for she was taking leave of what had been
her life's whole purpose during those ten years. Her grief
melted the cool self-command with which Margaret had
defended herself against the pain of this parting. And when
the little Duchess, who had at first appeared so poised, gave
free rein to her tears, the ladies of her train wept aloud, and
also the gentlemen who had accompanied her, and the Bur-
gundian nobles who had come to fetch her, and there were
many tears shed on this side and on that "et furent plusieurs
larmes plorees d'ung quartier et d'autre".

When Margaret of York arrived on the 22nd of June,
1493, at Malines with her newly returned grandchild, she
was well aware that the coming back of her namesake to
Flanders was no more than a preparation for another de-
parture. As on the day of her birth, there was still expected
of young Margaret "some strengthening alliance for the
House", some marriage advantageous to the dynasty.

This dynasty was now no longer primarily the House of
Burgundy, for which Charles the Bold had fought in vain.
It was now the House of Habsburg, headed by Maximilian,
Emperor Maximilian I since the death of his father Frederick
III, and its interests lay already at this period in very differ-
ent parts of Europe. These "interests" were in large measure
the butterfly imaginings of Maximilian's tireless brain, and
he pursued them with his unquenchable energy, his irrational

S6 The Pawn

optimism. To be Duke of Brittany, or King of Hungary,
Emperor of Byzantium, leader of the Holy War against the
Turks all this appeared, alternately or simultaneously,
upon his program. Giving himself no time for regret over
whatever escaped him or for lengthy speculation upon the
results of this mercurial butterfly chase, Maximilian wan-
dered about through the Empire, through Europe, inconse-
quent and charming, the despair of his councilors, the de-
light of his subjects, the idol of his hunting friends, the
laughingstock of perspicacious ambassadors like Machiavelli
the Florentine, or Quirini the Venetian.

In realizing his variable plans Maximilian followed two
systems, one martial, the other peaceful: fight and let fight,
marry and make marry. Because fighting was more expensive
than marrying and he never commanded sufficient funds,
he evolved a technique of alliances by marriage that was to
make his dynasty into the most powerful royal house of
Europe for hundreds of years.

His two children, Philip and Margaret, were invaluable
material for this purpose, and he used it with complete indif-
ference to their personal happiness. Margaret particularly,
with her excellent education, her French-trained intellect,
her Northerner's common sense, was a precious pawn in
the hands of her father the Emperor, to be played with care
but also with spirit and imagination.

In the beginning Maximilian had had only the Burgundian
interests of his wife and of his children to defend, principally
against the French king. But his election as King of the Ro-
mans and the death of his father, Emperor Frederick, broke
through this limitation. The throne of the Holy Roman Em-
pire bestowed wider perspectives upon its occupant. Europe

Cwwn Princess of Spain 8j

unfolded under his gaze. And it was a Europe where new
forces were busy making their way, where a new sense of
life was awakening that expressed itself in faith and crea-
tive urge, in prayer and preaching, in building and painting,
in song and poetry, in travel and trade. From Granada to
Copenhagen, from London to Rome, this old world was
seething with a strange ferment. Everywhere a new youth
broke through the impediments of a petrified past. Eastern
and western oceans gave up their secrets, thanks to the
marvel of the compass. Exciting treasures, gold, jewels,
spices, burst upon an eager Europe, grown indifferent to the
bliss and the threat of an all-too-often heralded hereafter,
trembling with desire for the taste, the smell, the riches, and
the temptations of an unfamiliarly beautiful today. Other
and higher worlds were revealed thanks to the art of print-
ing, which for the first time made accessible to the multitudes
the conquests of the great in the provinces of the mind. A
rejuvenated and flexible Latin created the crystal-clear at-
mosphere in which mutual understanding could grow un-
hampered by the confusion of national tongues. Europe
traveled, Europe corresponded, awareness widened, differ-
ences melted like mist in summer sun. European man stepped
across the threshold of a new century as a creator of beauty,
and armed with the achievements of his intellect he con-
quered the obstacles that for centuries had prevented the ma-
turing of his genius. It was a rebirth such as this old world
had never seen, the freeing of human personality from the
shackles of tradition, obedience, and rigidity.

Amid all the magnificence and glory of the European
Renaissance, however, amid the dazzling luster of art and
culture, various fields of human activity remained shrouded

88 The Pawn

in darkness. It has never been given Western man to arrive
at a completely harmonious unf olding of all his possibilities.
At the end of the fifteenth century, when it seemed as
though beauty blossomed wherever men's hands had la-
bored, the political and social life of these creators and lovers
of art remained in a state of brute barbarism. Power had al-
ways been the warp and woof of any social canvas upon
which cultures had worked the bright colors of their own
characteristics. This power used to be held divine and at
least in theory imbued with love. Divine power on earth
rested in the hands of the Holy Father, and provided
neither of the two was able to outshine the other he shared
it with his worldly brother the Emperor.

It had been this way for centuries, until beside these two,
and overreaching them, new bearers of power worked their
way upward, supported by newly rising social groups, by
slowly forming territorial domains. In the fifteenth century
the consolidation of the national kingdoms in Europe be-
came a fact, and worldly power, armies, weapons, wealth,
and authority slipped from the hands of Emperor and Pope
to fall into those of the pugnacious and war-loving national
princes, for whom power became the immediate and sole
aim of life, power for themselves and for the dynasties they
looked upon as the continuation of their own personalities.
These robber-baron kings were to sacrifice everything
the prosperity of their lands, the welfare and property of
their subjects, the lives of their wives, their sisters, their
daughters to their idee fixe.

This was the Europe in which Maximilian despite every-
thing one of the most human of these megalomaniacs was
to realize his unbridled dynastic egoism.

Crown Princess of Spain 89

Margaret of York, herself bound to the triumphal car of
the conquerors, had seen her foster-child and friend, Mary
of Burgundy, a will-less pawn in their hands. Should Mary's
daughter undergo the same fate? Already the difference in
character between the gentle, somewhat indolent mother
and the precocious child, returned from her French adven-
ture hurt, indeed, but not broken, and ready now to meet
any challenge, was making itself clear. Only externally was
her fate separated from that of the French king. A deeper
connection, not to be severed by human interference, held
Margaret's future imprisoned in the spell of France. Her
fate remained, as before, circumscribed by that of her
former husband. It was Charles's chimerical crusade
Rome, Naples, Constantinople, Jerusalem and his archaic
chivalresque imagination that intervened in Margaret's exist-
ence.

Once before she had served to cement a peace with
France. This time she was the obvious binder for the league
that was to be formed against Charles, who had carried out
his plan for an Italian campaign, and whose artillery, on
New Year's Eve of 1494, caused the houses of Rome to
quake and the hearts of the terrified Romans to trem-
ble.

Rome was but a stopping-place for Charles, whose ambi-
tion reached toward the imperial crown of Byzantium and
the conquest of Jerusalem. The Kingdom of Naples, ruled
by princes of the House of Aragon, had first to be con-
quered. Without striking a single blow the French marched
into Naples. They imagined themselves in a paradise. Was it
necessary to go farther? Charles presented himself with the
titles of King of Sicily and King of Jerusalem, decorated

$o The Pawn

himself with imperial insignia, rejoiced in the charms of
Naples and of the Neapolitan beauties.

But in the North of Italy ambassadors of his recently paci-
fied enemy, Maximilian, of his Italian friends who hated
him, of Ferdinand the Catholic of Aragon, whose blood rela-
tions had been driven out of Naples, had met together with
legates of the Pope. The League of Venice became a trap
for the French king, and it became furthermore the basis of
a collaboration between Ferdinand of Aragon a&d Emperor
Maximilian that was to be of the greatest possible signifi-
cance for the fate of Europe.

Not only of Europe. For the fate of the children of the
two united rulers also, Juan and Juana of Aragon and Cas-
tile, Margaret and Philip of Austria-Burgundy, who were to
provide living seals to this alliance.

Margaret's brother, Philip the Handsome, had been dis-
charged from the guardianship of his father in September,
1494, and had begun his career as an independent Burgun-
dian prince under omens that augured much good for the
Low Countries. For years the restless Maximilian had not
troubled himself about the education of his son, and the Bur-
gundian lords who had been his tutors had pretty well failed
to take account of the fact that someday Philip, in addition
to the Low Countries, would also have to govern the heredi-
tary Austrian lands. They had made a "Netherlandish"
prince of him, and so thoroughly that they had not even
had him learn the language of his father, of his Austrian
possessions. Philip the Handsome was popular from the mo-
ment when, as the "natural ruler" of Burgundy, he held his
joyous entries into the capital cities of his provinces. In the
eyes of his subjects he had every advantage over Maximilian,

Crown Princess of Spain 91

the foreigner, whose wars abroad for foreign interests had
sucked the Netherlands money-tills dry. And under the in-
fluence of his Burgundian councilors the young Archduke
accentuated the difference between his own policy and that
of his father, the Emperor, so strongly that for the sake of
peace with France he even maintained good relations with
his former brother-in-law, Charles VIII, against whom
Maximilian was busy forging the League of Venice.

In these circumstances marriage between Philip and Juana
of Aragon and Castile on the one hand, of Margaret with
the Spanish crown prince on the other, was a brilliant stroke
on the part of Maximilian, who in this way tried to curb the
pro-French policy of his all-too-Netherlandish son. And
both son and daughter obeyed the head of their House.

The wheel of Margaret's fortune turned anew. After
France, Spain. A foreign land that bore the mark of that
mysterious continent, Africa. Another world to the Bur-
gundian princess accustomed to the moderation of the Neth-
erlands, the harmony of Touraine. Burning under a Moorish
sky in summer, assailed by biting snowstorms in winter, a
country in which the nobility had been but lately tamed
under the royal couple, Ferdinand of Aragon and Isabella
of Castile, Spain in these years was being swept by the fire
of Torquemada's Inquisition. After their marriage had
welded the two kingdoms, the Catholic sovereigns under-
took to clear the Iberian peninsula of all who did not be-
lieve in the one God, whose hallowed instruments they con-
sidered themselves to be. In order that Spain should become
a single kingdom, ruled by a single ruling house, kneeling at
a single altar. With this intent, Ferdinand and Isabella had
turned their homeland into a battlefield, a prison, a smoking

$2 The Pawn

funeral pyre. This was the country where Philip the Hand-
some had found a bride, and where Margaret's bridegroom
was someday to possess the crown of Aragon and Castile.

The Spanish Infanta, Juana, was the first to undertake
the journey to her bridegroom. A fleet of not less than one
hundred and thirty ships was considered necessary to bear
the young princess safely along the inimical French coast.
A brilliant retinue surrounded her when she took leave of
her mother, Queen Isabella, in the harbor of Laredo. Her
trip to Flanders was full of adventure. Several of her ships
foundered in the autumn storms that howled across the
Channel. But the princess reached her destination unscathed,
to fall a victim instead to the languishing charms of the
handsome Philip.

The same fleet that had brought Juana was to carry Phil-
ip's sister to her new country. It was well understood that
many dangers would threaten her upon her voyage: tem-
pests and hurricanes and the risk of having to land on French
territory, of falling into the hands of the enemies of Austria
and Spain. But since it was known by experience how slight
was the likelihood that the Church would uphold a marriage
it had sanctified if it were not reinforced in a very human
manner by the lovers themselves Maximilian's marriage
with Anne of Brittany still lay fresh in the memory it
seemed best nevertheless to let Margaret, as Princess of Cas-
tile, undertake her hazardous journey. A marriage ceremony
was staged, and Maximilian honored his daughter, if not
with his imperial presence, yet with many gifts. He sent her
cloth of gold for her bridal dress and had her brother Philip
present her with the two rings that Maximilian had given
at his own wedding to Margaret's mother, his beloved Mary.

Crown Princess of Spain $3

At Malines on the 5th of November, 1496, the Arch-
duchess of Austria, within a few months of her seventeenth
birthday, married her unknown Prince of the Asturias, who
was represented by the Spanish emissary, Francisco de Ro jas.
On this dark winter's day the interior of the church of St.
Peter shone with the light of a thousand candles as Margaret,
radiant herself in her golden bridal gown and with a golden
crown upon her red-gold hair, knelt before the altar. Her
appearance did honor to her new royal title. Her new sister-
in-law, Juana, made but a dull impression beside all this
luster. It was whispered that in her first ecstasy over her
husband she had already been broken by severe disillusion-
ment.

Margaret's Spanish journey was to be full of tribulation.
After her marriage all preparations for the voyage had been
made, but the weather remained ominously bad and the
Spanish admiral who bore the responsibility for the venture
did not dare to leave the safe harbor of Flushing. At last, on
the 2znd of January, 1497, th e splendid company embarked.
Archduke Philip himself escorted his sister on board, after
spending a few days with her in the Abbey of Middelburg.

Scarcely had the fleet sailed out of the harbor when the
storm that had been roaring up the Channel for weeks broke
loose afresh, and the fragile vessels barely made the refuge
of Southampton harbor. Three weeks they waited there for
better weather, but when they set sail again despite a strong
wind, the flagship bearing Margaret and her Burgundian es-
cort collided with one of the other galleons. The princess
was put into a small rowboat which, battered anew by the
southwester, managed to take her back to Southampton.

A week later they tried again. The flagship took off first.

$4 The Pawn

It became separated from the rest of the fleet, lolled about
in a calm for a few days in the Bay of Biscay, and was then
attacked once more by a gale, even worse than those that
had been raging in the Channel. For days the Spanish seamen
fought for the life of their crown princess. No one on board
but had taken leave of his own life.

Even Margaret. And in the midst of her sick, desperately
wailing ladies in waiting, she was able to summarize her own
short existence as a princess with refreshing mockery in a
two-line epitaph, which, it was said, she had someone bind
to her hand, together with a purse of gold pieces for a royal
burial:

Cy-gist Margot, la gentiP damoiselle
Qu'ha deux marys et encore est pucelle.

(Here lies Margot, the gentle maiden
Who had two husbands and is virgin still)

Not an epitaph alone, these words, but an avowal as well
of an attitude that briefly outlines a personality. Among
the primitively egocentric utterances of her fellow-rulers,
"Margot" in the storms of Biscay reveals an ironical self-
criticism, a humorous sense of proportion, that are the more
surprising in a seventeen-year-old girl who could have
known only the norms of princely pride. She was already
more than Archduchess of Austria, Princess of the Asturias,
Queen of Granada and Leon; she was a woman who in the
face of death dared to express with a smile her belief in the
relativity of all values.

Her ship was washed ashore at Santander, where no one
expected her. Messengers hurried inland to announce the
news of the arrival of the Princess, while Margaret with her

Crown Princess of Spain 95

bruised and battered suite restored themselves to their official
dignity.

After a few days she was welcomed by a procession of
nobles, who had sent a caravan of mules in advance laden
with tapestries and vessels of gold for her comfort. They
then journeyed inland with their new mistress, and, six miles
from Santander, Margaret at last encountered her young
husband, who had come by rapid day stages with his father,
King Ferdinand, to meet her.

Beside his robust and warlike father, the Prince of the
Asturias seemed no more than a slender boy. He was nine-
teen, and his pale, narrow face with its dark-ringed, some-
what melancholy eyes was that of a young student rather
than of a man of action. The too rapid journey on horse-
back had greatly fatigued him, and the solemnity of the mo-
ment evidently weighed upon him. Don Juan, fond of belles
lettres and with a passion for music, was not happy at offi-
cial receptions of this sort, least of all when he himself, in-
stead of his royal parents, had to be the center of interest.
With a still, set face he had watched the approach of the
escort that was bringing him his life-companion.

He knew she was fair-haired and fair-skinned, but the
immobile features of the court portrait that had been sent
him could have given him no impression of the charm, the
easy and natural manner Margaret always showed at a first
meeting, and which fitted so little into the trammels of
Spanish court etiquette that had smothered Juan's own
spontaneity. Margaret did indeed follow closely the pre-
scriptions of the protocol: she kissed the hand of King Fer-
dinand, though he politely sought to prevent her, and in
this manner she also greeted her husband. But when clarions

yg The ?a<wn

and trumpets, tubas and horns thereupon let forth a blar-
ing fanfare so loud and high that "one could not have heard
the Lord thunder" "tant extreme et fort haulte que Ton
n'eusist peut oyr Dieu tonner" she forsook her role of
Spanish princess, unable to conceal her consternation at the
sudden deafening noise. A smile crossed Juan's pale face,
which Margaret answered with radiant frankness. Sinning
against etiquette, she stole the heart of her husband, taught
to consider etiquette more important than life itself.

The patriarch who had accompanied King Ferdinand and
Don Juan now gave the young couple his blessing. The
journey to Burgos was continued on horseback. Margaret,
gracefully at ease upon her ambling palfrey, rode between
the King and the Prince, stared at by fanners and burghers
who had come to applaud and to admire their new crown
princess from the North. Never had they seen their king
so gracious and so charming as in the company of his lively
daughter-in*law. Ferdinand, who saw to it that Queen Isa-
bella bearer of a royal crown in her own right, who un-
hesitatingly donned a coat of mail and mounted a charger
when her troops needed exhortation should in his presence
ride a mule as more suitable to her inferior position of spouse,
astonished courtiers and lackeys by himself assisting the
Princess of the Asturias to dismount when she arrived at
Burgos.

Much else happened on that day. All the southern Moor-
ish splendor Spain could flaunt, the glory of her church
treasures and holy relics, the enchantment of her palaces,
the elegance and luxury of her court attire, all passed be-
fore the eyes of Margaret and her suite like scenes from the
Arabian Nights. Together with the King she visited the

Crovm Princess of Spain $7

cathedral. Under a costly baldaquin, which the Governors
of the city themselves held over their heads, they then pro-
ceeded to the city hall, all hung with gold-brocaded hang-
ings and noble tapestries. There at last Margaret met the
woman who had contributed even more than Ferdinand to
the building of Spain's power: Isabella the Catholic, Queen
of Castile and Aragon.

Ninety ladies in waiting, all in cloth of gold, surrounded
the great queen as Margaret, graceful and distinguished in
her toilette of French cut, entered the reception hall. She
sank upon her knees before her mother-in-law and kissed
her hands. Her attendant ladies also kissed hands, and there-
after the new Crown Princess herself had to submit to this
formal greeting, ninety times extending her hand to a hum-
bly kneeling figure, ninety times feeling the touch of re-
spectful lips.

Next day was Easter. The royal family withdrew to the
convent of the Holy Trinity, and it was on this quiet Sun-
day, amid the murmurs of the cloister's plashing fountains,
that Don Juan's last reserves melted under the warm laugh-
ter of his foreign bride. Margaret, accustomed as she was to
the sans-gene of the Burgundian courtiers, the freedom of
her Flemish ladies in waiting, was both surprised and
touched by the embarrassed and retiring manner of the
young Prince, whom she had looked upon as her husband
ever since their first meeting. Had she not been united to
him by God before the altar of St. Peter's in Malines even
if it had not been his slim young person that knelt beside
her there, but the hardly attractive Francisco de Rojas? Did
Juan really need to keep such a distance? She was too ab-
sorbed in the joy it gave her to look at him to be offended

9 S The Pawn

by his ceremonious bearing, his prudery, at which she could
only laugh.

On that first Sunday, in her excitement over the unex-
pected happiness she felt approaching, she forgot all the les-
sons in Castilian court etiquette that she had been taught.
She called upon the help of her mother-in-law, who would
certainly have more understanding of what was a young
bride's due.

The Queen whose adaptable genius enabled her to be
whatever the hour demanded, so that she became diploma-
tist or mother, field marshal, economist or humble spouse,
all according to circumstances surrendered completely,
during these hours in the convent garden of the Holy Trin-
ity, to the happiness she saw awakening for her son. She rec-
ognized without hesitation in Margaret's natural, childlike
openheartedness, in her joy of living above all, the qualities
she had wished for in the wife of the serious, easily dejected
Juan. In this Flemish daughter-in-law Isabella found an ally
whom she was to support with all her influence as both
mother and absolute monarch. The small company that had
the privilege of sharing in the Easter celebration of the royal
family was disturbed by the candor with which the new
Crown Princess behaved like a gay friend of her Catholic
Majesty, neglecting the family ceremoniousness with which
the royal princesses always bore themselves so respectfully
toward their mother.

Before the two women, his mother and his bride, Juan's
shy reserve gave way. The lively blond girl from the North,
with her flashing intelligence and her French wit, brought
about what no Spanish beauty had been able to achieve.
Juan fell in love.

Crown Princess of Spain $$

Margaret's victory was as complete as it was sudden. That
Easter Sunday in the Holy Trinity, filled with the sound
of the convent bells and the playing of the many fountains,
was to remain with her throughout her life of cares and re-
sponsibilities as a beginning so full of promises that no ful-
fillment would ever exceed its expectations.

On the Monday, at eight in the morning, in the intimacy
of the convent chapel, the marriage of the young royal
couple received the blessing of the church in all privacy,
even in secrecy. Isabella's wisdom granted them a week of
undisturbed happiness in the seclusion of Santa Trinidad
before the tumult of the public wedding festivities should
overwhelm the early shyness of their love. For after
the Archbishop of Toledo had performed the official mar-
riage ceremony in the cathedral of Burgos on the third
of April, the young couple was swept along in such a
maelstrom of celebrations, joyous entries, tournaments,
bullfights, and banquets, that the single week they had
been able to spend together paled to a shadow of recollec-
tion.

Margaret's invincible resilience withstood these weeks of
festivity and happiness. Beside the frail figure of Don Juan
she sparkled, tireless, in the legendary jewels Queen Isa-
bella had pawned during the war against Granada and re-
deemed as a wedding gift to the bride of her only son. Mar-
garet was joyfully hailed as the first woman to be queen
over a united Spain, freed from the blemish of unbelief and
heresy, a Spain to which the fabulous realms of the "In-
dians" discovered by Columbus were to offer uncounted
treasures in tribute. The whole peninsula was jubilant over
the princely couple, and Juan's elegant wife was continually

200 The Pawn

the center of all courtly ceremony, the magnetic focus of
all admiration.

But what could scarcely affect Margaret's fair freshness
seemed too much for Don Juan's frail constitution, accus-
tomed to a careful equilibrium both physical and mental.
The endless journeys on horseback, the receptions that com-
pelled him to listen for hours to imposing speeches of princes
of the church and pompous magistrates, the banquets that
made no allowance for the very abstemious way of life
necessary to his health all this deepened the dark circles
under his melancholy eyes and bowed his too slight figure
in a posture of complete exhaustion. Blinded by the festivi-
ties, the honors, the pomp that surrounded her anew each
day, carried away by her own feeling, to which Juan re-
sponded with all the recklessness of a first, a finally discov-
ered passion, Margaret was too young, too egoistic, and
above all too strong to comprehend what danger threatened
her happiness. A few months after his marriage his physi-
cians had become alarmed at the overf atigued condition of
the Prince of the Asturias. They had called in the help of
Queen Isabella, had begged her to separate the all too irresist-
ible Crown Princess from her husband for a while. But the
Queen refused to interfere between those whom, according
to her honest conviction, God had united.

She had gone with King Ferdinand to Alcantara on the
Portuguese border to celebrate the marriage of their daugh-
ter, the Infanta Isabella, with the King of Portugal, when
the news reached her that her son, amid the festivities of
his entry into Salamanca, had been attacked by fever and
lay in danger of his life. Ferdinand left the same day, scarcely
resting till he had reached Salamanca. He found Juan dying,

Croivn Princess of Spain 101

quite prepared for the end, full of a calm wisdom, a noble
resignation. He recovered for a moment his happy smile of
the last months, when he told his father that the Crown
Princess was expecting a child was perhaps to present an
heir to the throne of united Spain. On October 4th, 1497,
five months after his marriage and at the age of nineteen, he
died.

Queen Isabella listened to the news of Don Juan's death
with majestic self-command. Tall and erect amid her horri-
fied ladies in waiting, her clear blue eyes fixed upon the tear-
stained face of the messenger, she stood motionless before
his sobs. "The Lord has given, the Lord has taken away,
blessed be the name of the Lord", she whispered.

Consternation was indescribable throughout the land that
had hailed the happy young royal couple. The whole popu-
lation went into mourning for the Prince, from whom a
reign of goodness and wisdom had been expected. The
brothers of all the guilds in Aragon and Castile laid down
their work for forty days. Rich and poor went about in
black, the mules of important citizens wore mourning
saddle-cloths that swept the ground. Black banners waved
from all the city gates.

And Margaret? Her life seemed ended. She laid aside her
gowns of gold brocade, in which Juan had loved best to
see her, and donned a mourning dress of sackcloth. Her
health gave way under the double strain of her grief and the
pregnancy that now seemed to be her only reason for exist-
ence. It was always possible that she, the widow of one
crown prince, might become the mother of another.

But the premature birth of a daughter, who died shortly

102 <The Pawn

after, broke the last threads that had still bound her to Don
Juan, to Spain. Isabella's motherly affection could not con-
ceal the fact that Margaret, though Crown Princess Dowa-
ger and very popular with the Spanish people, had never-
theless become a foreigner. And she felt this the more deeply
when new sorrow struck the King and Queen through the
death of the Infanta Isabella, the Queen of Portugal, who
had been heir to the Spanish crown since the death of Juan.
Her son Miguel, Crown Prince of Portugal, whose birth had
cost her her life, was recognized by Aragon and Castile as
heir to the throne. But the little prince had been born under
the disastrous constellation that now governed the life of
Spain. He died when barely two. And the crowns of Aragon
and Castile, of Granada and Leon, still worn by the two
builders of Spain, Ferdinand and Isabella, the Catholic mon-
archs, became the heritage of a tragic young woman, the
Infanta Juana, "the Mad", whose life had but a single con-
tent: to let herself be ruled by her passion for that frivolous,
inconstant, and irresistible husband, Philip the Handsome.

Thus Margaret's fate, which now seemed to be defini-
tively separated from Spain, was once more to be drawn
back into the orbit of Spanish history. For Juana, her sister-
in-law, was soon to give birth to the prince who would be
Archduke of Austria, Duke of Burgundy, King of Spain,
and finally also Emperor of Germany: Charles V, whose
rise to this last dignity was to be the work of his aunt, Mar-
garet, the former Crown Princess of Spam. Thus were
France and Spain, the two facets of Margaret's lost royalty,
to continue coloring her life with their changing reflections.

Margaret's Spanish role was done for the moment. Yet
she remained for two years more in the entourage of her

Crown Princess of Spain 103

mother-in-law, perhaps of her own free will, perhaps too
because Ferdinand was glad to have in his hands a weapon
against his ally Emperor Maximilian, and particularly against
his son-in-law, Duke Philip the Handsome, who after the
death of the Infanta Isabella had appropriated the tide of
Prince of Castile and whose influence on his daughter Juana
Ferdinand not unjustly feared.

At last, in September, 1499, the Crown Princess Dowa-
ger took leave of Granada and the Spanish court, to return
to the Low Countries robbed this time not alone of an
ambition and an illusion, but of a love as weU, and of the
only child she was ever to bear.

Espoir j'ay ey partant de mon enffance,
Et tousjours ay et veulx avoir espoir
La ou 1'ay mis, car vous debves scavoir,
Que tout mon bien il gist et mon avance.

Pour la source et bonne redevance
De tout malleurs que je pourroye avoir
Espoir j'ay eu.

Tout tant que j'ay, sans point de def alliance,
De la me vient, non pas de mon pouvoir;
Si peult Ton bien, par mes ditz, parcevoir
Que contre tous maleurs pour resistance
Espoir j'ay eu.

I have had hope ever since my childhood,
And have it still and want to have it there
Where I have laid it, for you should know that all
My welfare lies in it and my advantage.

As source and for good revenue
From all unhappiness that might befall me
I have had hope.

WTiatever I have, and with no failing ever,
Comes to me thence, and not from my power;
Thus, by my words, one may indeed perceive
That against all misfortune for resistance
I have had hope.

CHAPTER FOUR

Dudicss of Savoy

r T 1 HROUGH Spain, where the people had acclaimed her
JL as Crown Princess, through France, where once she had
been hailed as Queen, the Princess Dowager of Castile jour-
neyed back to the land of her birth. She had been permitted
to take with her the gifts that Ferdinand and Isabella had
showered upon her at her wedding. A train of heavily laden
mules followed her on her tragic way through Spain. Price-
less jewels, golden vessels, Moorish carpets and gold-inter-
woven tapestries, paintings and precious manuscripts made
up her baggage. But Ferdinand had not wished to take the
expenses of her journey upon himself and Margaret saw
herself obliged to borrow money from Spanish merchants
in order to reach the French border.

At Bayonne she was awaited by a magnificent Burgundian
escort sent by her brother Philip. Familiar and trusted faces
beamed upon her. With warm gratitude Margaret greeted
Madame de Commines, her mother's former governess, who
had been present at her birth and after her return from
France had acted as her Mistress of the Robes.

105

106 The fawn

The company moved northward by slow day stages. That
Margaret this time traveled overland was the consequence
of far-reaching shifts in European relations that had taken
place during her sojourn in Spain. Not only there had death
demanded its toll and played with crowns. Charles VIII of
France, once Margaret's husband, had suddenly died in
April, 1498. His marriage with Anne of Brittany had
brought him neither happiness nor descendants. His suc-
cessor, the Duke of Orleans, who called himself Louis XII,
understood that he had better not neglect the wife of his
predecessor if the French crown was not to lose anew the
dukedom of Brittany. What more plausible than a marriage
with the Queen Dowager? Anne, who still knew very well
what she wanted, saw her opportunity. She accepted Louis'
proposal, but under the provision that she alone should rule
over Brittany and control the giving of all offices. Had the
new Queen, as evil tongues alleged, actually been the new
King's mistress when he was Duke of Orleans? The serious
and homely Anne remained Queen of France and carried
on her needlework. She knew more than the scandalmongers
of the European courts. She worked at her embroidery and
held her peace. And thought, perhaps, with some wistfulness
of her romantic bridegroom Maximilian, whom fate had
withheld from her.

He liked the Tyrol best, the hunter Maximilian. But the
death of Charles VIII, who had once so grievously injured
him, gave him the idea of more lasting prey than the chamois
he was wont to pursue among the mountains. Had he not
once called himself Duke of Brittany, when he thought
Anne was to be his wife? Could he not derive some right to
the duchy from that fact? But this butterfly of his imagina-

Duchess of Savoy 707

tion was too unreal even for Maximilian. He followed it for
a while, but at the same time began to see still another pos-
sibility. Why not lay claim to the Duchy of Burgundy, his
first wife's old inheritance which, being a male fief, had
passed into French hands upon the death of Charles the
Bold?

No wonder Louis XII did not even trouble to react to this
absurd demand. But Maximilian, as of old, did not stop at
demands if he thought himself in a position to take some-
thing. He sent troops into France, who could achieve noth-
ing, however, since the French remained calmly inside their
walled towns and gave no battle. Maximilian had hoped that
his son Philip the Handsome would find the conquest of
Burgundy, from which he borrowed his ducal tide, an un-
dertaking that deserved his sympathy and support. But he
had reckoned without the Netherlandish influences at work
upon the young prince. The Low Countries, most consis-
tently, wanted peace with France, and a sudden attack to
restore a loss that had hardly been noticed at the time made
no appeal to them. On the contrary, Philip was already in
negotiation with the new French king, and Maximilian was
finally obliged to let himself be dissuaded from any aggres-
sive step. For how, without becoming ridiculous, could he
continue to stand up for Philip's rights when Philip himself
had affirmed to Louis that so long as they both lived he
would raise no claims to the dukedom of Burgundy? The
powers with which he was allied Spain, England, and the
Pope which could have helped him with his plan for a Bur-
gundian war, left him in the lurch and signed a treaty with
Louis XII. Venice as well let itself be roped in by Louis. So
the Emperor remained alone in his hatred against France,

io8 The Pawn

and he could not prevent his daughter from choosing to
make her way home from Spain across that country, where,
both as former Queen and as sister of Philip the Handsome,
she received a sympathetic welcome.

Margaret's wearisome journey, which lasted from the
end of September, 1499, till the beginning of March, 1500,
was not yet at an end when she received the good news that
her sister-in-law Juana had given birth to a son. She hastened
her progress, arrived at Ghent on the 4th of March, and
three days later functioned as godmother at the christening
of the little prince, named Charles after the last Duke of
Burgundy.

All of Ghent turned out for the stupendous celebration.
So that the populace should be able to enjoy as much of
the spectacle as possible, a continuous wooden platform,
spanned by thrice thirteen triumphal arches, decorated with
armorial shields and ten thousand flambeaux, had been
erected from the ducal palace to the church of St. John.
Along this flame-lit way, between the houses that glowed
to their very roofs in the warm reflection from the hun-
dreds of moving lights, the christening procession wound
toward the church. Hundreds of high dignitaries, Knights
of the Golden Fleece, members of the law courts, deans of
the guilds, all with torches in their hands, passed by, fol-
lowed by a few high nobles bearing the christening vessels.
The enthusiasm of the multitude rose to its highest pitch
as the widow of Charles the Bold, Madame la Grande, Mar-
garet of York who had also borne the father of the present
child to the baptismal font appeared with the little prince
in her arms. Beside her walked the Princess Dowager of
Castile in deep mourning. But the people scarcely heeded

Duchess of Savoy 10$

her, for after her came Seigneur Jehan de Luxembourg
carrying upon his arm Princess Alienor, sister of the new
Prince Charles, who had never been seen in Ghent before.
The sight of that little face, staring in wonder at the waver-
ing lights, drove the crowd into transports of joy.

Never before had the city of Ghent, so accustomed to
festivity, seen such a spectacle, and till early morning the
people milled through the streets, scrambling after silver
cobs strewn by rich burghers from their decorated dwell-
ings and gazing at the lights, the velvet-draped houses, the
suspension bridge all hung with lanterns and torches that
connected the Belf ort with the tops of the spires of St. Nico-
las.

Margaret remained for a few weeks in the circle of her
relatives, sharing their joy over the new heir to the throne
and their concern about his mother Juana, who was showing
ever more signs of what was later to be called her mental
derangement. She lived in silent seclusion, no longer seek-
ing consolation even in an exchange of letters with her par-
ents. Even Margaret's arrival bringing news from Spain
could not break through the sullen lethargy in which her
spirit had sought refuge from who knew what torments?
Margaret, full of good will toward her apparently deeply
unhappy sister-in-law, was unable to penetrate Juana's ab-
normal aloofness.

Was it Juana's wish that Margaret should not stay long at
the court of Ghent? Or did Duke Philip prefer to isolate
his lively and intelligent sister somewhat from Burgundian
political circles? He hastened in any case to have the Chateau
of le Quesnoy, south of Valenciennes, at a safe distance from

770 The Fawn

Flanders, made ready for her. He spared no expense to pro-
vide his sister with a residence to which she might retire in
all dignity with the shades of her two royal crowns. The
castle lay in the midst of a vast park, where Charles the Bold
had attempted to keep camels and dromedaries. Philip sup-
plied a less exotic menagerie: stags and fleet-footed deer
were introduced, whose graceful silhouettes were to de-
light the Princess of Castile on her morning walks.

Margaret still bore this title, as she still wore her mourning
and her grief for the young lover who had been her husband.
But she knew that her father and her brother were busy
once more preparing a new move that should shortly dis-
place her into a fresh field of the European chess tourna-
ment. While she was still staying at the Spanish court the
first rumors of a prospective marriage for the Emperor's
daughter had already raised their heads in diplomatic dis-
patches. Louis XII had been mentioned, who had just ar-
ranged to divorce his wife, Jeanne of France. Louis, how-
ever, had rejected his consort not for the sake of the fair
Margot, his playmate in the days of Amboise, but for that
of the dukedom of Brittany, which the Queen Dowager
Anne kept in her workbasket.

Other candidates for Margaret's hand had also been
named: first, Lodovico Sforza, Duke of Milan, surnamed il
Moro, a faithful ally of Maximilian. Margaret was still on
her way through France to Flanders when the Spanish am-
bassador in London informed her father-in-law, King Ferdi-
nand, that the King of Scotland appeared to have plans for
a marriage with the Princess of Castile. And a few months
later the same diplomat named Arthur, Prince of Wales*
who was engaged to Margaret's sister-in-law, the Infanta

Duchess of Savoy in

Catherine of Spain, This report decided Ferdinand to send
Catherine to England as soon as possible, to forestall Prince
Arthur's entering with another woman into the "unbreak-
able marriage" to which he had solemnly bound himself.

These must have been exciting years for the scheming
Maximilian, these years in which he could once again dis-
pose of his daughter's hand. Was it perhaps more advan-
tageous to marry her off to Vladislav, King of Hungary?
The proposal to this monarch was akeady on its way. And
meanwhile Margaret, powerless to take her fate into her
own hands, wandered like a prisoner among the deer of le
Quesnoy and awaited which was to be her lot: Scotland or
England or Hungary?

While Maximilian hesitated between countless possibili-
ties, Philip the Handsome settled the matter. Now that his
wife had become the only heir to Spain, he wished to go
to that country as soon as possible to have himself recog-
nized as the prospective ruler of Castile and Aragon. To
this end peace with France was essential. Untroubled by
the continuously anti-French policy of his father, Philip
was able to set the seal upon such a peace by the betrothal
of his small son Charles to the recently born daughter of
Louis XII and Anne of Brittany, Claude de France, And
for his sister Margaret the diplomatic Philip made a choice
with which both Louis of France and the Emperor Maxi-
milian could agree: the young Duke Philibert of Savoy.

Whether Margaret also showed satisfaction with this ar-
rangement may be doubted. For when Philip the Handsome
presented her with a document to sign in which she was to
declare that no form of pressure had been used upon her,
Margaret refused to set her name to it. By this action she

z/,2 The fawn

showed herself to be no longer the totally will-less pawn of
whom ambition and arrogance could dispose at pleasure. But
she still lacked the courage to oppose this new marriage
which Philip for his own selfish political reasons forced
upon her.

The Dukedom of Savoy, whither Margaret now saw her-
self bound, stretched in a wealth of varied climate and land-
scape from Macon in the wine-clad fields of Burgundy,
along the borders of France and Provence, to Nice on the
Mediterranean. It was bounded on the east by the Swiss con-
federacy and the dukedom of Milan, and its situation gave
it the greatest strategic importance, especially at the time
when a much-divided Italy exercised an irresistible attrac-
tion upon the robber-barons north of the Alps. Not only
Louis XII of France but the Emperor Maximilian as well
was bound to appreciate the need of living at peace with this
important buffer state, which could close off the approach
to the Italy they coveted.

The ducal House of Savoy had for more than half a cen-
tury been under predominantly French influence. The
young Duke who was to become Margaret's third husband
enjoyed an annuity from the French king, and his sister
Louise of Savoy, married to Charles of Valois, earl of An-
gouleme, was later to see her son ascend the throne of France
as Francis I.

This was the country and the ruling house that Philip of
Burgundy had picked out for his sister. And Philibert, the
Duke?

He was some months younger than Margaret, and carried
his name of "the Handsome" with the graceful ease of a

Museum Chateau de Versailles

Margaret of Austria at the Age of Three. Anonymous artist.

Private collection, France

Margaret of Austria at the Age of Ten. Anonymous artist.

Duchess of Savoy

perf ectly built athlete. Philibert was a fairy-tale prince, for
whom life meant an uninterrupted series of festivities, of
tournaments, hunting parties, balls, and banquets. He was
a whirlwind of a fellow, unable to hold out for very long
in any one place, avoiding repose and routine and skating
over the ice of his international relations with a flourish. His
people adored him for his youth and strength, his radiant,
daredevil spirits, his happy-go-lucky sensuality that could
enjoy all the good things of this earth. Life smiled upon him.
He did not need to bother with affairs of state and other
boring business, for fate had blessed him with a bastard
brother who desired nothing more than to take over the
task of governing. Philibert thanked heaven and his sensible
father, and went on dancing.

In body and mind he was the complete opposite of the
pale, learned, spiritual Infante Juan of Castile who had
taught Margot from Flanders what love meant and whom
she had worshiped for all his endearing qualities of poet and
dreamer, for his dark, always weary good looks, for his utter
devotion, given to herself alone. Could Margaret ever have
chosen such a contrast of her own accord? But her brother
had decided she had to go where he sent her.

The marriage contract was signed at Brussels on Septem-
ber 2 6,- -i 50 1. Philip promised his sister a dowry of two hun-
dred thousand pounds Flemish, to be paid in ten yearly in-
stallments at Geneva, The Duke of Savoy pledged her, in
case she survived him, an annuity of twelve thousand gold
ecus out of income from certain earldoms. He himself grace-
fully accepted the Order of the Golden Fleece, awarded him
by the Duke of Burgundy, and named his half brother, the
Grand Bastard Rene, as his representative at the marriage,

Pawn

which according to custom was to be solemnized by proxy.

And so Margaret once again took leave of her grand-
mother Margaret of York, of her brother Philip and his taci-
turn wife Juana, of the little Princess Alienor and the little
Crown Prince Charles, of her ladies in waiting and her cour-
tiers, and for the third time in her young life undertook a
journey of many weeks to an unknown husband. She went
through France, where this time too she was received with
festivities, gifts, and sweetmeats. In this spirit the popula-
tion of Rheims went to meet her in solemn procession with
an offering of four vats of hippocras, a stag, a wild boar,
does, peacocks, pheasants, partridges, hares, and rabbits.
Every day had its picnic feasts, washed down with the ex-
cellent wine of the country, for all along the royal route
names of the noblest vineyards of France gave forth their
fragrance. Almost daily new carts heavily laden with barrels
joined the baggage train accompanying the Duchess. For
the courteous French magistrates with gracious generosity
defrayed the costs of transport for the wine Madame could
not consume on the spot.

On November 2 2nd Margaret met the Grand Bastard of
Savoy at Dole, and a few days later the marriage in which
he stood proxy for his half brother was performed by the
bishop of Lausanne. It was a simple ceremony, and Margaret,
with womanly tact, wore a black velvet tabard lined with
black lamb's wool, without, however, appearing to be in
mourning, as Molinet the chronicler, who had a flair for the
nuances of fashion, reported with much appreciation.

But after the church ceremony Margaret could regard
herself as the Duchess of Savoy and freed from the mourn-
ing she had been wearing for the last four years for the

Duchess of Savoy

Infante Juan. At the ball given that evening she appeared
again for the first time in the glowing gold brocade that so
became her, and only the cut of her gown, designed in the
Spanish fashion, recalled her Castilian past. When she left
her room to go to the ballroom a jewelled girdle, set with
diamonds, rubies and pearls, was presented to her in the name
of Duke Philibert.

The Grand Bastard appeared to be a most engaging talker
and an excellent dancer. And the somewhat ridiculous cere-
mony that took place after supper was carried out in a spirit
of lighthearted comedy and playful coquetry. In her golden
bridal gown, Margaret had to stretch out upon a bed of state
set up in the reception hall, and the Grand Bastard laid him-
self down beside her in his costly suit, which, however, did
not make a very neat impression since, by the demands of
protocol, he had been obliged to bare one of his legs. A
throng of courtiers filled the hall in which this ceremony
was going forward, and they much admired the easy grace
with which the two principals behaved in their singular situ-
ation. They jokingly exchanged a few polite words, after
which the Grand Bastard got up from the bed and asked his
sister-in-law for a kiss, which was granted him. And to close
this idyllic scene in style, he went down on his knees before
the bed and declared himself the humble servant of his
Duchess.

Margaret, remembering in what a helpless manner the
representative of her Spanish husband had acquitted himself
of his task when obliged to act out the same nuptial comedy,
was completely charmed by the courteous Savoyard. She
bade him rise, said good night, presenting him with a fine
diamond ring, and they both withdrew "Madame le fit

u6 The Pawn

lever", says Molinet, "et, en disant bonne nuit, lui donna
une bonne bague de dyamant, et chescun se retira".

And after that, the meeting with her new husband, in a
convent not far from Geneva.

The moment Philibert rode through the convent gate his
zest for life set the tone. Hardly had he greeted his bride
and refreshed himself after the trip on horseback, when the
ball began, while the convent church was made ready for
the wedding. They danced till midnight, after which the
gay company attended the ceremony, conducted by the
bishop of Maurienne.

Again Margaret had been married in a convent but what
a difference between this boisterous, scarcely conventual
party and the quiet days in Santa Trinidad! The first weeks
of her stay in Savoy were taken up with such a dizzying
whirl of feasts and receptions that she hardly had time to
take in her new surroundings, let alone acquaint herself more
thoroughly with the character of this young and most fasci-
nating prince, whom all the women envied her.

It began with her entry into Geneva. Geneva, where at
that moment one could hardly move through the streets,
either afoot or on horseback, barred as they were by the
countless platforms that had been set up. Upon these were
exhibited the most extraordinary allegorical representations,
unrestrained in their bizarreness, past which the new Duch-
ess, seated on a white palfrey with saddlecloth of gold, held
her glorious progress. Iron trees, lacquered in blue and gold,
upheld with difficulty enormous blossoms that bore inside
their calyxes living figures representing Margaret's forebears
in their imperial and royal finery. Wild men and women

Duchess of Savoy nj

frightened the onlookers with their grimaces. Mountain
landscapes, decked with snow-covered pine forests, moved
by, and on the topmost pinnacle of a tower of Babel a lone
figure waved a banner with the arms of Savoy.

It was overwhelming. The abundance of Flanders, the
riches of Spain, the luxuries of France, all were overshad-
owed by the extravagance of this entry into Geneva.

Banquets and tournaments followed, and there was danc-
ing, dancbg. This was how life should be, according to
Philibert, radiant in his reckless beauty beside his ravishing
wife. Only with reluctance did he at last give his consent to
the departure of Margaret's Burgundian escort, which,
elated over so much homage, such entertainment, was finally
obliged to part from all these delights in order to return to
Flanders.

After the guests had gone Margaret and Philibert visited
a great number of cities in the duchy, which received them
with festivities and gifts. But such receptions succeeded
each other at increasing intervals. Things quieted down
around the young couple and at last Margaret had an oppor-
tunity to learn to know her new consort, her new surround-
ings, somewhat better.

Philibert was indeed no stranger to her any more. Perhaps
she did not guess, was never to guess, the emptiness that lay
hidden beneath his restless gaiety, his craving for variety,
for ever-new stimuli. His good looks, his charm, his un-
tiring youth blinded her to the shallowness that lay beneath
all this brilliance. With her adaptability, cultivated by much
experience, it cost her no effort to fit in with his capricious-
ness of a pampered charmer, and Philibert helped by being
passionately in love> which pleased and flattered her. Mar-

nS The Yawn

garet's Flemish ways, her zest for life, her inclination to lux-
ury and show, her robust humor, her straightforward sen-
suality found an echo in this gay beau who was her husband.
And what she had scarcely dared to hope began to happen:
the past with all its tears grew dim. She blossomed in a new
happiness, perhaps less sudden and overwhelming, but riper
and more harmonious than her feeling for Juan could ever
have become in the few months of their life together.

But Margaret was more than a good dancer, a liberal and
laughter-loving mistress, an entertaining table companion.
She had been brought up by the Regent of France, Anne de
Beaujeu, and had known and admired Isabella of Spain, but
she had also seen the humiliating misery of Juana, the help-
less slave of a husband as irresistible as Philibert. The rush
of festivities attendant upon her wedding had barely died
down when Margaret discovered that another task lay in
reserve for the Duchess of Savoy than that of being play-
mate to the Duke a task in which Philibert would never
take an interest and which he had with careless unconcern
allowed to slip from his hands: the task of government.

It was Rene, the Grand Bastard of Savoy, who with cun-
ning amiability and unlimited ambition had managed to take
all cares of state from Philibert's elegant shoulders. He was
lieutenant general of the dukedom and in fact absolute ruler
over the country, which he regarded as a personal conquest
of his own.

The discovery that her husband had not the slightest in-
fluence in his own territory filled Margaret with alarm and
indignation. She dealt with the Grand Bastard swiftly and
effectively. Charged with having conspired with the danger-
ous Swiss, he saw himself condemned as a traitor to his coun-

Duchess of Savoy

try, robbed of his dignity and his possessions and even of
the letters of legitimacy granted him a few years earlier by
the Emperor. From this first political struggle, which she
had conducted with all the means her injured pride had in-
spired her to find and with all the force of her strong will,
Margaret emerged as conqueror and absolute monarch of
Savoy. Had her accusation of the Grand Bastard been
grounded on a real misdeed? Or was she already making use,
in this her first political appearance, of those means justified
by their end of which her generation always knew how to
avail themselves with so much ingenuity?

However this might be, after the defeat of the Grand
Bastard, who sought refuge at the French court, the skies
of Savoy seemed to shine cloudless above the young ducal
couple. Philibert amused himself, and Margaret was the per-
fect consort, missing no single ball or tournament, joining
in every hunting party. Margaret on horseback, with her
ivory hunting horn on a bandoleer over her shoulder, was
a picture of sportive elegance, the pride of Philibert, whom
she never left out of her sight for a moment, for fear that,
without her admonishments, he might overdo his hunter's
recklessness.

Tourneys and hunting parties and feasts might fill Phili-
bert's life, but to Margaret they were only a pastime. Her
real interest, which with the years was to grow into a pas-
sion that completely absorbed her, lay elsewhere. Affairs of
state, and foreign policy in particular, fascinated her. The
chateau of Pont d'Ain, where she spent most of her time, be-
came the center of the political life of Savoy, the young
Duchess with a small number of highly capable secretaries
and councilors wielding the actual power, while the Duke

120 The Pawn

basked in the sun of his popularity and, amused at the mascu-
line interests of his so very feminine consort, gladly left the
worry of governing to her.

Margaret did not limit her attention to Savoy alone. The
quiet of the ideally situated castle gave her ample oppor-
tunity to go more deeply into the stirring political events,
to make a study of the relative powers of the rulers who held
Europe in the grip of their unscrupulous ambitions. And
though she was not yet strong enough to interfere in the
game in which until now she had been little more than a
pawn, the Duchess of Savoy was in a better position than
any of the robber-baron kings to judge and even to foresee
the clashes between their interests, and above all between
their characters. For she had an advantage over them: while
they scarcely knew one another, Margaret knew most of
them from personal contact. Her woman's intuition, sharp-
ened by humiliations, and the intelligent use of her special
experience had given her, young as she was, an insight such
as few of her contemporaries could achieve. The Emperor
of the Holy Roman Empire was her father and she knew
him as it were by instinct. The Duke of Burgundy, Philip the
Handsome, was an open book to his sister, although her ac-
tive life had for the most part kept her far from him. She
knew France, the French mind, the French king, as well as
the great enemy of France, Ferdinand of Aragon, whose po-
litical methods she had been able to learn from his gifted
consort, Queen Isabella.

In addition to all this rich experience she possessed one
privilege that was more powerful the less it was known and
recognized: she was a woman. She disposed over invisible,
silent weapons, while these belligerent potentates rocked

Duchess of Savoy 221

Europe with their war cries. Tact, insight, flexibility that is
stronger than the strongest fortress, intuition and charm,
womanly levelheadedness and common sense made up the
arsenal upon which she was to base her power. Margaret,
with velvet gloves and a smile on her lips, was often to ap-
pear more powerful than the plumed and armored figures of
her masculine opponents.

During her years of study in Savoy she knew how to sur-
round herself with a few excellent advisers and assistants,
whose admiration bound them inseparably to her. There was
in the first place the jurist Mercurio de Gattinara, head of
her Privy Council, a shrewd judge of human nature, a re-
fined stylist and an untiring worker, who was to rise in her
service to Grand Chancellor of Castile, finally to Cardinal.
The amiable Louis Barangier, who acted as her secretary
during the years in Savoy, had previously accompanied her
to Spain and had been her chamberlain after her return to
the Low Countries. Her second secretary, Jean de Marnix,
grandfather of Marnix of St. Aldegonde, the great poet and
musician of the Netherlands, was never to leave her till
her dying day. He became her treasurer-general and was
her principal assistant in foreign affairs, in which his influ-
ence was widely sought and often royally rewarded.

With these three faithful and devoted collaborators at
her side, the Duchess of Savoy pursued her study of inter-
national events and their significance. After her departure
from the Netherlands it had been primarily the activity of
her brother, Archduke Philip, that had attracted the atten-
tion of the courts of Europe. His position and his prestige
were radically changed after the inheritance of the Spanish
lands had fallen to his wife, the helpless Juana that is to

122 The Pawn

say, to the ambitious Philip. His policy, which up to this
time had been purely Netherlandish and hence in opposition
to the dynastic interests defended by his father, Maximilian,
also changed under the influence of the powerful territories,
spread over the whole of Europe, that were to be united in
his hands. Austria, the Netherlands, Aragon and Castile,
Granada and Leon, Naples and Sicily, and the undefined
realms of the New World Columbus had added to Spain's
possessions all this would in future come to Philip. The
fact that Ferdinand and Isabella were still alive prevented the
immediate exercise of his world power, but this in no way
restricted his pretentions. In the company of his wife, the
real heir to the throne, he traveled across France to Spain,
in order to receive the homage of the Cortes as prospective
king. On his return, he went twice from Lyon to visit his
sister, at the castle of Pont d'Ain and at Bourg-en-Bresse,
where Duke Philibert provided a rich variety of amusements,
while Margaret made use of the opportunity to compare her
views on international relations with those of her brother,
the "Prince of Castile". She entirely approved of Philip's
policy of an always closer rapprochement with France and
must undoubtedly have encouraged him in his endeavor to
bring Maximilian also, whose dislike of everything French
had gradually become second nature to him, into the camp
of Louis XII. From Savoy Philip moved on to the Tyrol,
where in fact he was able to win his father over to this policy.
The Treaty of Blois, concluded in September, 1504, be-
tween Maximilian, Philip, and Louis, announced the miracle
that these three autocrats were henceforth to be a single
soul in three bodies.

Duchess of Savoy 12$

September, 1504, month of glory and triumph for Philip
the Handsome, brought the deepest misery to his sister Mar-
garet.

It had been a scorchingly hot, dry summer. The hazy blue
distances that had made the terraces of Pont d'Ain famous
seemed to be shrouded in a film of burnt brown. It was too
warm to eat, too warm to hunt, too warm to dance. Philibert,
visibly suffering under his enforced lack of activity, begged
Margaret like a spoiled, obstinate child to grant him but a
single day of hunting pleasure, if she did not want him to
die of boredom, sicken for want of exercise. Margaret ar-
gued that he must be careful, must spare himself for her sake,
his servants and his horses for theirs. Philibert yielded, sulk-
ing: this was no life for a man, hanging round all day among
his wife's ladies in waiting, being burdened by her coun-
cilors, who thought they should consult him if he was always
within range. The heat, the ducal impatience made the other-
wise so harmonious atmosphere of Pont d'Ain oppressive
and restless.

Until one fine day Margaret weakened and restrained him
no longer. Philibert, happy as a child, made plans for a boar
hunt in the environs of the castle. It was one of the first days
of September and even early in the morning the sun was
burning over the withered countryside of Bresse with a
tropical intensity. The hunting horns echoed through the
park of Pont d'Ain. The triumphant sound drew further
and further away. Quiet reigned in the halls and rooms of the
castle, where Margaret's secretaries were beginning their
day's routine of state affairs.

The day passed in silence. The Duchess worked undis-

124

turbed. Until in the afternoon a messenger came to inform
her that at his midday meal the Duke had been attacked by
a sudden and serious indisposition. In a panic of fear the
Duchess heard out the story of what had happened.

After hunting all morning at a pace which the other
knights had not been able to maintain in the oppressive heat,
the Duke had finally arrived, exhausted and perspiring, at
the spring where the company was to meet for lunch.

Gasping with fatigue, he had thrown himself upon the
ground in the shade and demanded beaker after beaker of
the ice-cold spring water, and had drunk in so rapid and un-
controlled a manner that his nobles had repeatedly cautioned
him. Shortly thereafter, an excruciating stitch in the side
made him writhe, and before the end of the meal it was
clear that the Duke could not continue the hunt. With the
greatest circumspection he was brought home by his com-
panions.

Physicians were hastily summoned. But when they finally
arrived from Bourg, they found the Duke already in mortal
danger, and their primitive science was powerless against the
inflammation of the lungs which in a few days brought the
young athlete to the edge of the grave. In vain Margaret
tried to do something to save him. She spent whole nights
praying, made solemn vows to undertake distant pilgrim-
ages, if her life's joy might only be preserved. She had her
priceless pearl necklaces crushed to powder, and the doctors
prepared a drink, worth fortunes, but useless. Margaret had
to be told that there was no longer any hope of saving her
husband's life. Her own was saved by her courtiers when in
her despair she attempted to throw herself from a window.

Duchess of Savoy 125

It seemed as if the young Duchess would not survive her
husband. With the same passionateness with which she had
been happy, she gave herself over to a despairing grief. She
refused to be parted from the dead body, and her courtiers,
dreading lest her reason could not withstand this strain, kept
close watch over her day and night for fear she might again
attempt to take her own life.

But her healthy nature kept the upper hand. Countless
decisions, formalities, and regulations which she had to obey
demanded her attention. She was not only a deeply unhappy
woman she was at the same time, for the moment, still the
ruling head of Savoy, although Philibert had been succeeded
in name by another half brother, Charles III, an insignificant
youth of eighteen. The problems that came up for settlement
were still submitted to the judgment of the Dowager Duch-
ess. The reading of masses, the burial of the deceased, the
national mourning, were all cares that compelled Margaret
to wrench herself away from her sorrow.

She answered with the greatest decision the question of
where the mortal remains of the Duke should be laid to rest.
On his deathbed Philibert had reminded her of the vow his
mother had taken in order to save the life of his father, Phili-
bert of Bresse, when in 1440 he lay at death's door because
of a hunting accident. This sacred promise included the con-
dition that the Duchess would restore the old Benedictine
cloister of Brou that lay just outside Bourg-en-Bresse and
that through poverty and neglect had fallen into ruin.

Philibert's mother, Marguerite de Bourbon, had not re-
deemed the promise and Margaret, reminded in so tragic an
hour of this debt, resolved to carry out what her mother-in-

126 The fawn

law had failed to do. The cloister of Brou was to be recon-
structed and the simple chapel in which Marguerite de Bour-
bon lay buried, to be rebuilt into a worthy mausoleum for
the man who had given Margaret a few years of happiness.

Six days after his death Philibert's embalmed body was
brought to Brou and laid beside his mother. His heart that
tempestuous heart with which he had loved good living and
his fair young wife Margaret kept at the castle of Pont
d' Ain, where she was still to stay frequently during the next
two years. She remained for the time being in Savoy, where
she had been happy and where countless spiritual and prac-
tical cares continued to demand her presence. Six months
after Philibert's death she acquired the first pieces of ground
for the construction of his mausoleum, and appointed the
contractors who were to carry out the first stages of the
work. The rapid realization of her plans brought with it
from the start enormous expenses that had to be met from
the proceeds of her dower. The regulation of this matter,
however, brought Margaret into conflict with the new Duke
of Savoy, young Charles III, who could not share his sister-
in-law's concept of her place and her task in his country.

Margaret's commanding nature did not adapt itself to the
fact that together with Philibert and her married happiness
she had lost the task of governing, which had filled her days
in these last three years, had kept her mind busy, and had
satisfied her ambition. She, the Dowager Duchess, no longer
had any right whatever to the place that Philibert had so
gladly left to her.

For the domains that had been in part promised to her at
her marriage, in part given her later by Philibert, were only
the guarantee of her annuity, and she could no longer exer-

Duchess of Savoy 127

cise governmental control over them. Young Charles HI was,
it is true, still less capable of ruling independently than Phili-
bert had been, but this did nothing to alter the fact that in
any case the helm must be taken out of the widowed Duch-
ess's hands. Nevertheless Margaret saw in the circumstance
that Charles was no more than an awkward and helpless child
a possibility of being awarded sovereign power at least over
the lands of her dower. She actually succeeded in coming to
an agreement with the intimidated young Duke, thanks to
the fact that she was able to bring the authority of her father,
the Emperor, to bear on the case. Thus Margaret by the
Treaty of Strasbourg retained Bresse, Faucigny, and Vaud,
where she continued to dispose of the most important offices
and where the conduct of internal affairs remained in her
hands. Only the highest judicial power continued to lie with
the Duke, who set the further condition that Vaud should
under no circumstances whatever be separated from the
dukedom of Savoy.

Margaret's position as Dowager Duchess of Savoy ap-
peared to have been satisfactorily settled. Yet the future was
to make clear how much room the Treaty of Strasbourg left
for chicanery on the part of Duke Charles, which Margaret
opposed with the resolute energy of her ever increasing
authority. "My lord brother is listening to wrong advice to
treat us in this manner", she once wrote in later years to one
of Charles' advisers concerning the experience she had been
having with her brother-in-law, "and whoever it is who
gives him these counsels has neither his advantage nor his
honor in view, and in this way he will lose more than he can
ever gain. You should know that we have no inclination to
tolerate such things, which dishonor and harm and grieve

The Pawn

us. If my lord brother thinks that by such unmannerly treat-
ment he can reduce us and put his intentions through, he
has the wrong idea. For all that we are a woman, our heart is
of a different nature, and we cannot do any good to those
who work us harm" "Car jagoit que soyons femme, si
avons le coeur d'aultre nature. . . ."

This woman's heart of hers that wanted to be happy and
to make others happy, that had rejoiced in expectation, only
to be hurt again and again, this heart Margaret had buried
in the church of Brou, at which she was to build for five and
twenty years before she should herself at last be laid to rest
there,

But she never forgot the song that heart had taught her,
and whenever it came to her mind in the long years in which
she "could do no good to those who work us harm", a gentle-
ness came over her of which the pages of her poetry albums
speak:

Le temps m'est long et j'ay bien le pourquoy,
Car ung jour m'est plus long qu'une sepmaine,
Dont je prie Dieu que mon corps tost ramainne
Ouestmoncueurquin'estplusavecmoy. . .

Time is long to me and I have reason,

For one day to me is longer than a week,

So I pray God to bring my body soon

To where my heart is that is no longer with me. , ,

THE

^Playe

Tant que j e vive, mon cueur ne changera
Pour nul vivant, tant soit il bon ou saige,
Fort et puissant, riche, de hault Kgnaige:
Mon chois est fait, aultre ne se f era.

II peult estre que Ton devisera;
Mais ja pour ce ne muera mon couraige,
Tant que je vive.

Jamais mon cueur a Tencontre
D'ung franc vouloir Ten ay mis en ostaige;
De Ten oster point ne suis si voulaige;
Ou je 1'ay mis a toujours mais sera,
Tant que je vive.

Long as I live, my heart will never change
For no man living, though he be wise and good,
Strong, powerful and rich, and of high lineage:
My choice is made, different it will not be.

Quite possibly there will be whisperings;
Nevertheless they'll not disturb my courage
Long as I live.

Counter to this my heart will never go;
Of a free will in hostage have I placed it;
To take it thence, so fickle am I not;
Where I have laid it, it evermore shall be,
Long as I live.

CHAPTER FIVE

Regent of the

A /f ONOTONE and imperturbable, the Ain rippled
IV JLalong the terraces and vineyards of the castle, and the
same sound of steadily flowing water that had once formed
the accompaniment to such harmonious happiness now rang
as undertone to Margaret's sorrow.

The costly gala dresses hung unused in her wardrobe. Her
jewels, her pearl-broidered caps of gold brocade, all the
golden ornaments with which she had so gladly enhanced
her fairness, lay neglected behind the heavily studded doors
of her cupboards. On the few occasions when the Dowager
Duchess left the safe seclusion of Pont d'Ain she appeared in
black, without jewelry. A close-fitting white widow's cap
covered the ruins of the golden hair for which she had been
so much admired and which, as a most personal expression
of mourning, she had cut oif . This cap of finely pleated ba-
tiste Margaret was never again to exchange for any more
worldly headdress. Never again was she to display her great-
est beauty. Though she did let her hair grow again, it re-

The Chess Player

mained concealed under the white gossamer linen that for
years was to be her only finery. And thus, in black, her pale
face bordered by the widow's cap, Pieter van Coninxloo
painted her at the castle of Pont d'Ain, at her brother Philip's
command.

This moving portrait was not intended for Philip himself;
He needed it for the complicated plans that filled his pro-
gram since, through the death in November, 1504, of his
mother-in-law, Queen Isabella, her royal crown had become
his own. Philip the Handsome, King of Castile, had acquired
other interests than those of Philip the Handsome, Prince of
Castile. He was preparing for a journey to Spain, so that the
Cortes might render him homage as their ruler.

The fleet bearing the royal couple was, however, cast
upon the English coast by storms. Philip fell into the power
of the English king, Henry VII, and in this critical situation
he did not hesitate to sacrifice to his dynastic policy, which
Henry would have to support, one of the most essential in-
terests of the Low Countries, the favorable trade agreement
with England of 1496. A new agreement was concluded, the
advantage of which lay entirely on the English side. "Inter-
cursus malus", the Netherlanders called it, and it was to be
sealed by two marriages. The young Burgundian Crown
Prince Charles, formerly betrothed to Claude de France,
was to marry Henry VII's daughter, Princess Mary Tudor
and Henry himself, but lately widowed, fell in with the
idea of letting the last years of his avaricious, money-seeking
life be cheered by a young and wealthy widow: Philip's
sister Margaret.

This had in any case been for some time the wish of the
King of Castile, and the portrait that van Coninxloo came

Regent of the Netherlands

to Pont d'Ain to paint was intended to give the sickly old
miser an impression of the charms of his prospective wife.

Margaret let herself be painted but about a marriage she
thought no more. While at Pont d'Ain she was devoting her
whole attention to the plans for the cloister and the church
at Brou, Philip the Handsome in March, 1506, signed the
contract that was to make her Queen of England. But Mar-
garet had matured from a child under guardianship with no
say in her own aif airs into a person who knew very well
what she wanted. She refused to let herself be used any
longer in the political game of which she had now mastered
the rules herself. Her father and her brother had traded her
off three times, she said bitterly, and not once had she stood
to benefit. And while acrimonious letters passed back and
forth between Philip the Handsome, Maximilian, and Henry
VII, while the Emperor worked himself up over the fact
that Margaret's refusal would cause him to lose the subsidy
Henry, his son-in-law-/Vz-,rp, was to have given him so that
he could at last get himself crowned in Rome Margaret sat
in her quiet castle, bowed over the drawings of Brou, her
heart filled with memories, her head full of plans for Phili-
bert's mausoleum.

The pledge she had taken over from her mother-in-law
included primarily the reconstruction of the cloister at Brou,
and for this Margaret did in fact destine the first available,
still very modest funds. In place of the Benedictines who had
abandoned the dilapidated structure, some Augustinian
monks came from Lombardy to give their advice, and under
their influence the simple sketches changed into plans for a
roomy and sunny convent. The monument to the dead must
give way before a home for the living, and of the new church

The Chess Player

only the first stone had so far been laid. It was Margaret her-
self who, on August 28, 1506, carried out this ceremony in
a pouring summer rain.

Her creation at Brou, growing slowly under her continual
supervision, gave Margaret a deep satisfaction and was her
consolation in the lonely years before she was called to the
task that later was to absorb her completely. Here at Pont
d'Ain, where the sound of the river was never drowned out
by noises of festivity, Margaret built herself a new existence,
a new content for her life, among the books and manuscripts
of her ever growing library, among the animals, the dogs
and birds, to which she gave her affection, among the build-
ing plans and drawings of Brou. Whereas during Philibert's
life she had been surrounded by nobles and courtiers, her
court now took on a more and more artistic and cultural
stamp. It was in this period of her life that she found the
versatile device in which the dissonance of her disasters re-
solved itself into a harmony that could once again be hope-
ful: Fortune, Infortune, Fortune. The insight born of suf-
fering showed Margaret new values in life, and for all her
loneliness she discovered herself sometimes richer than be-
fore. . . .

Until in the autumn of 1506 the disconcerting news flew
through Europe, penetrating to the castle of Pont d'Ain, that
the King of Castile, Philip the Handsome, had suddenly died
at Burgos on the 25th of September. He had dined in the
Carthusian monastery of Miraflores, had played pelota after
the meal, and had become very much overheated. After that
he had drunk cold spring water. . . . Few particulars were
needed to make clear to the Dowager Duchess the course

Regent of the Netherlands 735

things had taken. The death of that other young prince, also
surnamed the Handsome, remained engraved in her memory
with all its cruel details. And when rumors hissed through
all the European courts that Philip the Handsome had been
poisoned at Burgos at the instigation of his father-in-law,
Ferdinand of Aragon, Philip's sister was not among those
who attached any belief to them. Had she not once before
seen a strong young life ebb away under her very eyes, seen
the cleverest physicians powerless against a sickness stronger
than the treachery of poison?

The death of her brother struck Margaret while she was
still barely restored from the loss of Philibert She gave ex-
pression to this new sorrow in a few lines of verse, not in
French, in which she often set down her feelings with a
melancholy grace, but in the much more disciplined Latin,
which lends a stern dignity to her plaint:

Ecce iterum novus dolor accedit

nee satis erat inf ortunatissime Caesaris filiae

conjugem amisisse dilectissimum

nisi etiam f ratrem unicum

mors acerba surriperet.

Doleo super te frater mi, Philippe

Rex optime,
nee est qui me consoletur.

Behold once more new sorrow falls

nor was it enough in utmost misfortune to lose

the husband deeply beloved of Caesar's daughter

without bitter death now snatching

her sole brother.

I grieve for you, brother mine, Philip

best of Kings,
nor is there anyone who can console me.

The Chess Player

"Nor is there anyone who can console me". More cruel than
the new loss was the lack of any consolation that might have
mitigated it, and the loneliness that could not be shared with
any equal.

In the midst of her mourning life challenged Margaret,
and a task was laid upon her which in the eyes of today seems
unbearably heavy for a young woman of six-and-twenty.
Through the death of Philip the Handsome a minor child
later to be called Charles V had become master of the Low
Countries. And once more, as at the death of Mary of Bur-
gundy, Maximilian, grandfather of Prince Charles, was des-
ignated regent of the Burgundian provinces. Although the
Emperor had expected it would cost him a hard fight to be
recognized as guardian and regent by the States General of
the Netherlands, who still looked on him as a foreigner, this
happened without much friction. The Netherlands had,
thanks to a period of national governmental policy, learned
to regard themselves more as a unit than before, and now
adapted themselves more easily to the leadership of Holland,
Zeeland, and Brabant, which favored Maximilian's regency.

But in addition to Burgundy, the Kingdom of Castile had
also become the heritage of six-year-old Charles. It seemed
obvious that the regency over this country should be en-
trusted to the real heir, Charles' mother, the Infanta Juana,
in whose name Philip the Handsome had actually been rul-
ing. But Juana, who had already shown signs of being ex-
tremely unbalanced, suffered after the death of her husband
from a serious mental derangement. The confusion in Cas-
tile, where all leadership was lacking, increased day by day,
finally bringing its natural solution: Ferdinand of Aragon,

Regent of the Netherlands

whom the Castilians knew and feared, was appointed regent
over their country during the minority of Charles V.

Thus was the regency settled in the two parts of Charles'
future empire. But while Ferdinand could without difficulty
be present in Castile whenever circumstances demanded, it
was impossible for the Emperor to leave his empire in order
to take on the government of the Netherlands. It was neces-
sary to appoint a lieutenant general, and Maximilian's choice
fell upon his daughter Margaret, Dowager Duchess of Sa-
voy, who had originally been co-heir to the Burgundian
lands.

The Emperor, who as a rule was not guided by any sense
of reality, had here taken a decision that spoke for his knowl-
edge of people and his political insight. For in his daughter
Margaret were united a number of qualities which, in spite
of her youth, made her better suited than many a statesman
for the particularly difficult office of Regent of the Nether-
lands. She was a child of the land over which she was to
rule and the people knew her as the daughter of their be-
loved Duchess Mary, and sister of Duke Philip. Though she
spoke neither Flemish nor Dutch, she had been born in Brus-
sels, the people of Ghent had hailed her as a baby, and the
citizens of Middelburg and Flushing had watched her de-
parture for Spain as Princess of Castile.

But Margaret was cut out for this office not alone through
her birth in the Netherlands. She knew the customs and the
governmental forms of many European realms, and in her
journeys, in her solitude as well as in her happiness, she had
acquired a ripe knowledge of human character. "She has
tested", writes Lemaire, "the loyalty, the service, the kind-
ness and the constancy of some; the falsity, the unkindness,

The Chess Player

the meanness and the frivolity of others, the perseverance
and the mutability of diverse human affections" "Ha ex-
perimente la foi, le service, la gentilesse et la Constance des
uns: la fraude, la nuisance, la vilite et la legerete des autres:
la perseverance et la muablete de diuerses affections hu-
maines". She knew what human loyalty and affection were
worth, she recognized the note of dishonesty in the voice
of the flatterer, the chink of gold in the assurances of the
venial. She knew the relativity of all worldly values, of all
human convictions; she had learned to remain vigilant in
prosperity and to give her confidence only to those who
had shown themselves worthy of it. And she possessed the
inestimable gift that made it possible to carry responsibility:
a self-confidence that never became overestimation and that
was continually checked and kept in equilibrium by a
healthy self-criticism.

It was this self-confidence that made her accept without
hesitation her father's proposal that she should leave the
peaceful castle of Pont d'Ain for the Netherlands, to carry
on the government for her minor nephew in the name of
the Emperor. On October 29, 1506, she left the Duchy of
Savoy for good, traveling to Germany in order to visit his
Imperial Majesty her father in Rottenburg on the Neckar
and later in Strasbourg. On March 18, 1507, Maximilian
signed her appointment as his "procureur general", entitling
her to receive the oath of the States General, which they
were obliged to give Maximilian as guardian over Archduke
Charles. Equipped with this authorization and accompanied
by certain of her Savoyard councilors and secretaries, Mar-
garet journeyed on toward the Netherlands, to meet the
task of her lifetime.

Regent of the Netherlands

That task did not appear an easy one. The young Regent
was indeed welcomed with enthusiasm. The people were
grateful for her appointment, and from the moment when,
before the States of Brabant at Louvain, she first took the
oath to respect the Privileges, her poise and tact, her natural
charm, and her true majesty made an excellent impression.
The people of the Low Lands were at that moment fully
prepared to take her to their hearts. Her life as a princess,
full of suffering and sorrow, worked on their imagination,
her widow's weeds compelled their respect, and they were
charmed by her humorous eyes and generous smile. At her
festive entry into Brussels the populace wept tears of joy
and gratitude for their "national" princess, and when two
days later she went to the town hall, where the oath-taking
ceremony took place, and appeared on the balcony to show
herself to the people, their enthusiasm knew no bounds and
she received ovations such as she, the much hailed, had never
yet experienced.

But Margaret was too sensible to let these demonstrations
of devotion blind her to the difficulties of her still very un-
certain position. She knew the way of the Netherlander,
who acclaimed their rulers but were suspicious of their
government; who wanted to govern themselves and had al-
ways refused to let themselves be used in the service of in-
terests they could not look upon as their own. At her last
visit to her father she had understood to the full that Maxi-
milian was proposing to continue his old dynastic policy and
to employ the resources of the Low Countries to satisfy his
demand for power. She was quite prepared to contribute her
share to the good name of the House of Habsburg, for which
she knew herself co-responsible. But in the Netherlands she

140 The Chess flayer

had also taken upon herself a personal task and she was firmly
decided to give her utmost to make her regency a success.
Maximilian had perhaps hoped to possess a willing tool in
his daughter; but he had not reckoned with the fact that,
woman though she was, she was not like other women. Mar-
garet knew herself that she possessed "le cueur d'aultre na-
ture", that her own heart was different. She had her own
ambition and bore her own responsibility. She was con-
vinced that she could not better serve her House and there-
with her father, the Emperor, and her nephew Charles, the
prospective ruler of the Netherlands and Spain, than by ad-
vancing the prosperity of the Low Countries, which had
been entrusted to her care. And whenever her views differed
from those of the Emperor, she was not prepared to let her-
self be guided by his authority if this would compel her to
act against her own firm conviction.

Immediately after her arrival in the Netherlands Margaret
showed her fine political instinct by choosing as her resi-
dence, not one of those Flemish cities always ready for tu-
mult and revolt, like Bruges or Ghent, but the quiet, very
Burgundian-minded Malines, where Maygaret of York, to
whom it had belonged, had lived so happily. She was no
longer there, Madame la Grande, to welcome her energetic
granddaughter in her high function. She had died in this
very Malines about two years before. But the sympathy she
had won from the population of the town flowed forth to
meet her granddaughter as soon as she entered the city.
Malines was proud that the Regent herself now came to live
here, for since 1501 it had had the privilege of sheltering the

Regent of the Netherlands 14,1

heir to the throne and his little sisters under the care of
Madame la Grande.

Besides the function of regent Margaret had taken a sec-
ond, not less important task upon herself: to be foster mother
to the four children Philip and Juana had left behind in the
Netherlands. They were the eight-year-old Eleanora, Mad-
ame Alienor, as she was called, the seven-year-old Archduke
Charles, and the Archduchesses Ysabeau and Marie, aged
respectively five and one. Their three-year-old brother Fer-
dinand, poor little hostage, was at the Spanish court far from
his mother. After the death of her husband Juana had given
birth to still another daughter, Catherine, who had remained
with her at the castle of Tordesillas.

With the death of Madame la Grande the court of Malines
had lost its center and the city lived withdrawn into itself
and peaceful behind its ramparts and canals. Across the
drawbridges, through the gates, a rural traffic moved all day
long of carts and wagons, pedestrians and horsemen. The ar-
tisans of Malines, the beU and cannon founders, the tan-
ners and drapers, brought their products along the water-
way; and in the center of the intimate little town, along the
quays of the Dijle, there was always a flapping of sails, a
rattling of cranes and pulleys. Outside the walls meadows
and farmlands stretched toward the hazy Flemish horizon,
the ditches that bordered them drawing strips of light
through the ever-moist green land, while countless wind-
mills turned industriously in the Flemish breeze. It was a
good life within the walls, behind the safe bastions, in the
narrow wooden houses of Malines. They hugged each other
close, these houses, around the few stone structures the

The Chess Player

town possessed: the bell tower, the court of justice, the old,
old market halls. The court of justice, moreover, housed a
national authority: the Grand Council, Burgundy's highest
court of law.

On her arrival in this quiet provincial town Margaret
found no proper archducal palace in which she could es-
tablish herself. The city government had bought back the
"Keizerhof " where her foster children lived and which had
formerly been the property of Madame la Grande. Oppo-
site this modest house, which scarcely merited the name of
palace, Emperor Maximilian bought a house from a certain
van Watervliet and this was furnished as the Regent's resi-
dence, largely at the expense of the city itself. It was a sim-
ple brick building, with two wings which housed the service
quarters and the stables, built around a court.

This unpretentious "Court of Savoy", as it was to be
called, was to be Margaret's home for the rest of her life.
Here she was to prepare the great political conquests that
were to win her a place of honor among the great statesmen
of her time and to bring to her foster son, Monseigneur the
Archduke Charles, a world-wide power. Here she was to
assemble the art collections, the paintings and manuscripts
which, together with the music of her famous choir, consti-
tuted her chief distraction from her double task of regent
and foster mother. In the peaceful privacy of this modest
palace she, in whose hands converged the threads of every
European political intrigue, was able to create for herself a
setting of feminine comfort and quiet harmony. The Regent
of the Netherlands surrounded herself with poets and paint-
ers, architects and men of letters. The nobles and ladies of
her court reflected the influence of the taste and preferences

Regent of the Netherlands

of their mistress. They made music, wrote poetry, composed
and recited at this little court in the quiet and seclusion of
Malines, and the spirit of courtesy and culture that reigned
here contrasted favorably with the loose and drunken man-
ners of so many other courts.

Margaret Madame, as she was known to her entourage
was the moving spirit that gave life to this small world.
Here she commanded in the capacities of ruler, of devotee
of art and music, of educator and foster mother, of excellent
housewife. Her common sense had at once made her realize
that the honorable function with which her father had en-
trusted her would make heavy demands on her treasury.
And although she possessed a double dower, the Spanish
and the Savoyard, when she settled in the little palace in the
narrow street of Malines, Margaret understood that in this
country over which she now ruled and of which she had
been co-heir, she in fact could call not a single square foot of
land her own. She had been obliged, when she went to France
as a bride at the age of three, to give up all her rights to her in-
heritance from her mother, Mary of Burgundy. Margaret
knew that her office of regent would be only temporary and
she foresaw that in her old age she would have no bit of
land and no house to retire to without danger from others
"que en notre viel eaige neussions ung pied de terre ny une
maison pour nous retirer sans dangler daultry". She sent
her trusted friend Gattinara to her father to beg that she
might be given for her own some part of the Burgundian
lands, to which after all she had an equal right with her de-
ceased brother. She armed her messenger against all the ob-
jections she knew her father would make. If the Emperor
said he would give his daughter a pension when her task as

144 The Chess Player

regent was finished, Gattinara must not let himself be dis-
missed with this, but must answer that, while Madame in-
deed had little experience of life, she knew very well what
it meant to act as regent for a young prince. This was always
an ephemeral office and, however well one cared for the
interest of one's pupil, once he became independent all the
good work was likely to be forgotten.

And Margaret, with the realistic outlook of the wise
housewife who sets aside provision for the winter, asked
the Emperor for the earldom of Burgundy (Franche-
Comte) that good land to the east of the dukedom
of the same name where she had always been received
with so much sympathy. The earldom, an imperial fief of
which Maximilian had the disposal, adjoined Margaret's
former duchy of Savoy. If she was Countess of Burgundy,
she declared to Gattinara, she would be able to keep the
Savoyard lands of her dower well in obedience and subjec-
tion "en bonne obeissance et subjection" which might
stand the Emperor in good stead if the neighboring Swiss
ever made difficulties for him. "Otherwise not", the practi-
cal daughter of this adventurous father concluded with
realistic terseness "Autrement non".

The argument did not fail of its effect. Though only
after prolonged and difficult negotiations, Maximilian finally
agreed that his daughter might regard a number of lands and
manors, primarily the earldom of Burgundy, as her own.
And after February, 1509, Margaret could call herself: By
the grace of God Archduchess of Austria and Duchess of
Burgundy, Dowager Duchess of Savoy, Countess of Bur-
gundy, Charolais, Romont, Bage en Villars, Dame of Salins,
Malines, Chateau-Chinon, Noyers, Chaussin, La Perriere

Ktinsthistorisches Museum, Vienna

Philibert of Savoy and Margaret of Austria. A medal of 1502.

Regent of the Netherlands

and of the lands of Bresse, Vaud and Faucigny. But not until
she had expressly assured the Emperor once more that all
these properties should remain the possession of the House
of Habsburg and that she had no intention of diminishing
the inheritance of her nephew and nieces, since she was of a
mind to use the proceeds in the service of their interest and
had no wish for any other heirs.

Joyous entries, oath-taking ceremonies, and receptions be-
longed to the past. The palace at Malines was nearing com-
pletion and at last the Regent found the peace to dedicate
herself wholly to her new function, and to go more deeply
in detail into the problems she had taken over from her late
brother.

They were not unknown to Margaret, these problems of
the Netherlands. She knew the history of her mother's
House, she knew the experiences that her father, Maximilian,
had had to go through with the troublesome inhabitants of
the Low Countries. She knew their virtues, which in the
eyes of a ruling prince became failings: their unbounded
urge for independence, their unbending, stubborn resistance
to compulsion, which in countless instances had made them
altogether ungovernable.

Margaret was no stranger in this country as Maximilian
had been. She was a child of Flemish soil and her heart beat
with the same tough rhythm of dour inflexibility as the
hearts of Ghent and Bruges. Margaret also, like her new
subjects, was easily led by those of whose loyalty, insight,
and talents she was convinced. But in most cases she pre-
ferred just as her Netherlander did her own insight to
that of others, trusted herself rather than others, and was

The Chess Player

never to employ the talents of others without using her own
critical capacity.

The young Regent had still more characteristics in com-
mon with her subjects which placed her in a better position
than anyone else to understand and value them. She too was
industrious and practical, realistic and thrifty, fond of order
and regularity. She was averse to the romantic, artistic chaos
in which her father, the Emperor, felt so much at home.
Like the Netherlanders too she had respect for money,
which is acquired with so much difficulty and which Maxi-
milian was accustomed to spend with the royal indifference
of the bohemian as soon as and in whatever manner it came
into his hands. Chance which always played such a role
in Maximilian's life, and by which he let himself be led be-
cause of his own weakness in following any straight line
he might have drawn for himself was for his daughter a
factor to be eliminated as far as possible and to which she
would certainly never leave any important decisions.

But besides these .very positive qualities the Regent pos-
sessed gifts that are seldom met with in combination with
them: tact, flexibility, adaptability pre-eminently feminine
virtues, necessary though they are in that most masculine of
all professions, leadership of an army. And in fact the talents
of a field marshal were necessary in the battle that Margaret
now had to conduct in the Netherlands. It was in part a
silent battle against those subjects who feared in their Re-
gent the representative of the foreign master Maximilian;
against the coterie of nobles who had so easily been able to
make Philip the Handsome Follow- Advice, as they called
him do what they wanted and who now assumed they

Regent of the Netherlands

could apply the same methods in dealing with his sister. But it
was also a real battle of fire and sword that Margaret had
to carry on where her brother Philip had left off: the war
against Gelderland, that bitter heritage from Charles the
Bold.

To achieve victory in these two wars, the diplomatic and
the armed, the Regent needed more power than her original
commission granted her. Two years after she had begun her
function she was able to extract from her father a general
mandate, so that her authority in the Netherlands was no
less than that of the Emperor and guardian himself.

And herewith Margaret had attained what she wanted and
indeed had also earned: the independence she required in
order to defend unhampered the interests of her House and
of the provinces that had been entrusted to her care. She no
longer needed to fear she might become what Maximilian
in his broken French called "ung person perdu et oblie, mis
errier de la monde" "a person lost and forgotten, hidden
in a corner". She herself had suggested these contemptuous
words to her father when she refused to enter into the idea,
which once more began to appeal to Maximilian's optimistic
imagination, of her marriage with old Henry VII of Eng-
land.

The Regent indeed agreed with her father that it was of
the greatest importance to keep the English king in a good
mood. But she had other and more real reasons than those
of the Emperor. She had not needed to look about the Neth-
erlands very long in order to observe how harmful the last
trade agreement with England had been for her subjects,
that agreement which Philip the Handsome, shipwrecked

The Chess Player

and powerless, had been forced to conclude in England and
which the Netherlanders had called the Intercursus malus.
Her first act as Regent of the Netherlands in the field of
foreign policy dealt with the restoration of the earlier, far
more favorable state of affairs. And Henry VII, who still
had not given up the hope of one day making the Dowager
Duchess of Savoy Queen of England, most graciously met
her halfway, with the result that by Margaret's efforts the
Intercursus malus, concluded in an evil hour, was annulled.

Friendship with the English king was excellent, Margaret
felt. But it must remain friendship. Even though Maximilian
wrote her bluntly that she could only serve the House of
Burgundy if she agreed to a marriage with Henry, and even
though he declared that Margaret's fear lest in England she
would be no more than a prisoner of Henry's was entirely
unfounded. For, wrote the Emperor, the happy bridegroom
would be made to promise that the bride could spend four
months a year on the continent in order to exercise her gov-
ernorship of the Netherlands, or longer if that seemed neces-
sary. And if Margaret would only say yes, everybody would
be happy, because Maximilian would henceforth be left in
peace by that hardheaded Henry, and Margaret would be
ruling over England as well as the Netherlands and would
have no reason to feel herself neglected or slighted.

But Margaret stood her ground. Her troubles were
enough for her not to want the government of England and
the withered, greedy English king in addition. The trade
agreement that had been her first aim was in the bag. In the
quiet of her palace at Malines the Regent warmed herself
before her own wood fire, lived according to her own
rhythm in surroundings attuned exclusively to her own

Regent of the Netherlands 149

views, her work, her relaxation. She had declined the prison
Maximilian had so temptingly set open before her. No
kingly crown of Europe would ever counterbalance the
freedom that at last, after so many years of sorrow, had fallen
to her share.

She had her freedom, yes, but also her cares. There was
William of Croy, Sieur de Chievres, whom Philip the Hand-
some on his departure to Spain had appointed Governor of
the Netherlands and who now saw himself driven out of
this important post by a woman. There were the Flemings,
the States General, who followed their old policy and re-
fused to grant subsidies for Maximilian's undertakings and
for the war with Gelderland which, they said, was nothing
more than a dynastic affair the Emperor should pay for out
of his own pocket. And finally there was Charles of Gelre,
who gave the Burgundian government no rest and the fight
against whom was costing always more money without pro-
ducing any conclusive results.

It was an old quarrel that had arisen at the time when
Charles the Bold, in the seventies of the previous century,
had offered himself as arbiter in the struggle between the
old Duke of Gelre, Arnout, and his restless, rebellious son
Adolf. To put an end to all this wrangling Arnout had then
simply sold his rights to Gelderland and Zutphen to Charles
the Bold. The Golden Fleece, which had to pass on this
matter, without hesitation recognized the rights its chief,
the Duke of Burgundy, had acquired by purchase and con-
demned young Adolf to prison for life for his rebellious
and inhuman behavior toward his poor old father. His chil-
dren, Charles and Philippa, were fetched away from Nij-

The Chess flayer

megen, which was occupied by a Burgundian army, and
were entrusted to the care of Margaret of York. And thus
Gelderland had become a Burgundian province, though not
in the view of the Gelderlanders themselves: they had never
had much sympathy for old Arnout, against whom they had
all joined Adolf in rebellion.

Incorporated in the Burgundian realm, Gelderland was al-
ways to remain ready to take up arms against the dynasty
that had bought it. Its young Duke Charles grew up at the
court of Burgundy. From Charles the Bold's successor,
Maximilian, he learned the art of war, which was to stand him
in good stead later in defending his own lands. During one
of Maximilian's campaigns against Charles VIII, this heir to
the throne of Gelderland was taken prisoner and thus be-
came a weapon in the hands of France. In 1491, thinking the
moment had come to make use of him, the French sent him
back to Gelderland, provided with money and troops, to
the jubilation of its people and the long-lasting annoyance
of Burgundy.

This was the background of that "Gelderland war" which
was to cause Margaret so many sleepless nights, a war re-
peatedly interrupted by armistices and futile treaties, which
remained an irritating guerilla but nevertheless devoured a
great deal of money. And the States were never prepared to
provide the necessary funds, although the Regent sought to
convince them that their own interest would be served if
Gelderland could be pacified. Margaret had to pay her
troops out of an empty treasury. To her father she wrote in
1511 concerning her desperate financial situation, that "if
all were to be lost for a thousand florins the treasurer says he
has no way of finding them" "Et si tout se devoit perdre

Regent of the Netherlands 757

pour mil florins, le tresorier dit n'avoir moyen de les
trouver". Even when she went to inspect the army before it
left for Gelderland, she was forced to recognize that she
had indeed an excellent artillery, but very little powder, and
she wrote the Emperor that she was collecting this indis-
pensable article from all quarters but would certainly not
have enough money to pay for it. She offered a part of her
own income and would gladly have pawned all her jewels
if anyone would loan the necessary sum "s'il se trouvoit
homme qui voulsist prester ladite somme dessus; car, Mon-
seigneur, vous scavez que suis vostre seulle et unicque fille"
"for, Monseigneur, you know I am your one and only
daughter."

Yet she heard from her subjects the reproach that the
Emperor was squandering good hard Netherlands cash out-
side the Netherlands borders. So tense was the mood in the
country during the first years of her regency that Maxi-
milian, who still cherished his costly plan of finally getting
himself crowned Emperor in Rome, even wrote Margaret
that he would postpone his "vyage de Rome" if the Low
Countries should mutiny "sy le pays d'embas vouderant
tonber en mutery". But Maximilian could not go back on
his Roman journey just for the sake of the people of Gelder-
land.. The Regent would have to handle them without his
help.

Margaret saw but one way to this end: to create a good
understanding with her former playmate of Amboise, Louis
XII, without whose support Charles of Gelre had always re-
mained powerless. And by chance Maximilian was in a good
mood to let his daughter try out a rapprochement with
France. For he had asked the consent of the Venetians to

152 The Chess Player

pass through their domain with an army on his way to
Rome and to his indescribable indignation this had been
refused. Reason enough for Maximilian to attack the Vene-
tians. But his expedition had little success. The Venetians
conquered a number of cities that belonged to the hereditary
Austrian lands, and the Emperor was finally compelled to
a three-year armistice by which he had to leave these losses
in the hands of his opponents.

It was at this moment that the Regent of the Netherlands
presented him with the idea of seeking a rapprochement
with France, in order to take vengeance together with Louis
XII upon the arrogant Republic on the Adriatic. Maximilian
would, to be sure, have to make some sacrifice to this end.
In order to win Louis' favor, he would have to abstain tem-
porarily from the war with Gelre which he was so gladly
conducting at the cost of the Netherlanders. The Regent
too would profit by such an arrangement; her dissatisfied
subjects would be left in peace and could keep their purses
shut. To Charles of Gelre a favorable armistice must be
off ered. Later, at some suitable moment, the Emperor could
always hold a reckoning with him.

Sulkily and with a certain irony Maximilian agreed. Let
Margaret, since she seemed to know best, just try it out her-
self with the French. It would do her good, he wrote, if
for once she became the dupe of their fine words, so that
thereafter she would be more careful "afin que cy apres y
prenez meilleur garde". In October, 1508, an armistice was
concluded with Charles of Gelre, and one month later Mar-
garet journeyed to Cambrai, where she had convoked a
meeting with the leader of French foreign policy, the Car-
dinal-Legate of Amboise. This dignitary would also repre-

Regent of the Netherlands

sent the Pope if, as was expected, other more important Eu-
ropean problems came up for discussion in addition to the
question of Gelderland.

There was no doubt that peaceful Cambrai was about to
experience days of great political significance. The countless
ambassadors with their followings of secretaries and ser-
vants, with their bodyguards and military escorts, brought
an unaccustomed bustle into the little city, and on the ad-
vice of her solicitous father the Regent had requisitioned
one half of the city for herself and her suite, while the Car-
dinal-Legate of Amboise disposed of the other half. The
Sieur de Chievres and the other personages of Margaret's
Council settled at Valenciennes in order to be at hand if the
French should play delaying tricks according to their cus-
tom "vouldroient jouer des trainneries selon leur cous-
tume", as Maximilian expressed it.

But Margaret was not to be intimidated by the adroitness
of the impressive Cardinal-Legate. She, the twenty-seven-
year-old princess, in her dignified tabard, her spotless wid-
ow's cap, went to this, her first great diplomatic conference,
with an unbounded self-confidence. And she had not mis-
judged herself. The negotiations had often given her a head-
ache, she wrote to her ambassador in England, and she
and the Cardinal-Legate often got into each other's hair,
but in the end they had been reconciled and had become the
best of friends. But not until after the energetic princess had
had to threaten her opponent with her own instant depar-
ture from Cambrai if the King of France did not agree to in-
clude the King of Navarre, a faithful adherent of Emperor
Maximilian, in the covenants that were being drawn up.

The Legate agreed and after two weeks of exhausting

The Chess Player

discussions Margaret could return to her peaceful residence
with the knowledge that she had brought to heel one of the
cunningest diplomats of Europe and had, moreover, given
life to a political constellation which would stagger that con-
tinent for more reasons than one. To Maximilian the treaty
proclaimed on December 10, 1508, in the Cathedral of Cam-
brai, meant a satisfaction such as he would never have been
able to provide for himself. Officially, to be sure, there had
come under discussion only the lifelong peace concluded be-
tween the Emperor and his grandson Charles on the one hand
and the King of France on the other; the one year's armistice
with Charles of Gelre, and the investment of Louis XII with
the dukedom of Milan. But Margaret had made use of those
two weeks of personal contact with Amboise to conclude
a secret agreement concerning Venice which was to prove
the real content of the treaty of Cambrai. This secret treaty
bound the Emperor, the Pope, the King of France, and the
King of Aragon to attack the Venetian Republic, and di-
vided the booty meticulously among them. If any one of
the allies had conquered his own portion, he promised to
help the others get possession of theirs. England might also
join in if it wished, and Hungary, Savoy, Mantua, and Fer-
rara were to be invited to take part in the happy feast: the
Venetian table was richly enough provided and a few guests
more or less would make no difference. The Pope was to
add luster to the whole by excommunicating the people and
government of Venice and proclaiming the war against the
Republic a holy undertaking. Furthermore, he was to release
Maximilian from the just-concluded three-year peace with
the Signoria by calling him to the defense of the Church.
This was the daring plan by which Margaret's tact and the

Regent of the Netherlands

cunning of Amboise sought to sweep the mighty Venetian
Republic off the chessboard of Europe. A plan entirely in
accord with the spirit of the time, and in which the Regent
of the Netherlands made use of the same means that the
greatest opponent of her house, Louis XI of France, had
applied with so much success against Burgundy. But her
aim was not exclusively the annihilation of proud Venice.
Her personal interest, peace in the Netherlands, would be
served in this way. For through this raid sanctified by the
Pope she was able to divert the bellicosity of those two
former enemies, Maximilian and Louis XII, away from the
provinces for which she now bore the responsibility and
to direct it upon a far distant part of Europe. She flung a
precious booty to the grasping potentates in order to win
time for the consolidation of her own position in the Neth-
erlands, which would only obey a ruler who brought them
peace. Margaret brought them that peace and it did not
go against her own moral conviction nor that of her sub-
jects that this should take place at the expense of a state
which had always lived in harmony with the Low Coun-
tries. The States voted a sum of 60,000 pounds as a gift to
the Regent, who had been able to protect her country from
the ravages of a new war.

From the point of view of the Netherlands the League
of Cambrai might have been a success; as a European under-
taking it was doomed to failure. At first everything seemed
to go according to the agreed schedule. Louis XII marched
over the Alps with an irresistible army and destroyed the
Venetian forces in a battle near Agnadello. Like vultures
Pope Julius II and Ferdinand of Aragon flung themselves
upon their appointed shares of the booty only the Em-

The Chess Player

peror was obliged to hold back ignominiously from the rob-
bers' feast, because the Empire and the hereditary Austrian
lands had refused him money and troops for an attack on
Venice. Insufficiently armed, Maximilian had had to watch
the successes of Louis, and it was not long before a chilling
suspicion crept into the Emperor's mind that perhaps the
triumphant French arms in Italy might eventually be turned
against himself. The mistrust was reciprocal. The friendship
formed by the charming Regent of the Netherlands and the
jovial Cardinal after they had matched strength at Cambrai
had not yet been accepted by their superiors. The suspicion
grew among the allies of Cambrai, while the Venetians,
though beaten on the continent, relied upon their tested
diplomacy, the oldest and most experienced of Europe. Pope
Julius II was the first to conclude peace with the Republic.
He had conquered what he wished to possess, and he com-
pleted his work by calling up his other allies to a holy war
against France, which was threatening to get the whole of
Italy into her power.

Ferdinand the Catholic gladly lent an ear to this call. He
had hardly welcomed the victories of France. In October,
15 1 1, a treaty came into being between the Pope, Ferdinand,
and Venice, ostensibly for the protection of the Church.
This alliance was called the Holy League, and its holy pur-
pose was to drive the French out of Italy. On Louis' side
there remained but one suspicious and undecided ally: the
Emperor. Following Cambrai, another treaty, concluded at
Blois in November, 1510, had once more underlined their
vacillating union. Once again France brought a powerful
army into the field and defeated the combined Spanish and
Italian troops at Ravenna. But the French commander, Gas-

Regent of the Netherlands 757

ton de Foix, brother to the new Queen of Aragon, lost his
life in the battle, and this disaster so discouraged the French
that their victory proved useless. Three months later they
had abandoned all their conquests and stood once more at
the foot of the Alps, over which they had marched into Italy
so shortly before.

And history repeated itself. The allies of the moment
Pope, Aragon, and Venice f ell a-quarreling over the divi-
sion of the spoils. The battered Venetian Republic took note
that her allies were not going to let her keep her position as
a great power. And before her fate could be sealed by Ferdi-
nand and the Pope, she joined in with that same France
which, by the treaty of Cambrai, had sold her to almost the
whole of Europe.

In March, 1513, the Regent of the Netherlands was
obliged to take stock of a complete shift in the relationships
which her first interference in European history had tem-
porarily brought about. Like a landslide of suspicion and
hate, greed and jealousy, the consequences of her policy
spread over the continent. She remembered her old enmity
against the House of Valois, her father's hatred of the Vene-
tians. Only one thing did she wish to rescue at any price,
and that was the good understanding with England, where
in 1509 young Henry VIII had succeeded his father.

When she thought the right moment had come, Margaret
did not hesitate to abandon totally the principles of that cre-
ation of her own, the League of Cambrai. At her urgent
request the Emperor finally broke his connection with
France, and on April 5, 1513, a new treaty between Maxi-
milian and Henry VIII, known as the League of Malines, in
which the Pope and Ferdinand of Aragon also took part,

258 The Chess Player

came into being in Margaret's residence. The object of this
alliance was a joint attack upon France.

This time too it was apparent what interests the Regent
of the Netherlands was defending in this her second venture
into politics. The condition was expressly set that the Low
Countries should remain neutral in this war against France,
while furthermore a new armistice of four years was con-
cluded with the still dangerous Charles of Gelre. Once again
Margaret had acted in the spirit of the provinces entrusted to
her care. The torch of war, set ablaze in Malines by the hand
of the Dowager Duchess of Savoy, was to carry out its de-
structive work beyond the boundaries of the Netherlands.
And when the last visits of courtesy had been received, and
the last baggage wagons of the special emissaries had rattled
away over the cobblestones of Malines, the Regent could
return to her more peaceful work: the daily burdens of gov-
ernment and the care of her foster children, in whose hands
lay the future of her House and of Europe.

Belles parolles en paiernent
A. ces mignons presumptieux
Qui contref ont les amoureux
Par beau, samblant et aultrement.

Sans nul credo, mais promptement
Donnes pour recompence a eulx
Belles parolles.

Mot pour mot:, c'est: fait justement,
"Ling- pour ung, aussy deulx pour deulx:
Se devis il font gracieulx
Respondes gracieusement
Belles parolles.

Fair words in payment
To those presumptuous charmers
Who would lovers counterfeit
By fine pretense and otherwise.

"With credence none, but promptly
Give for recompense to them
Fair "words,

\Vord for T?vord, 'tis done exactly,
One for one, also two for trwoi
If they converse with graciousness
Do you graciously reply
Fair words.

CHAPTER SIX

Bonne Tante

"TNIPLOMATIC messages, missives to the Emperor,
JL/ letters to commanders in the field and to ambassadors at
foreign courts Margaret's secretaries knew no rest in those
first years of her rule over the Netherlands. The days of the
young Regent were as full as those of a modern prime min-
ister. In contrast to her father, the Emperor, who was always
roving around the Empire, Margaret did not leave her be-
loved Malines save when it became necessary. Overburdened
with work, she seldom found time for distraction, and only
for short periods when the health of her foster children
demanded it did she exchange the rather damp air of Malines
for the wooded scenery of Brussels, where Monseigneur the
Archduke Charles amused himself with hunting and archery.
Margaret's program of work was organized on the strict-
est principles and the Court of Savoy lived entirely in the
rhythm set by her occupations. When Madame attended a
meeting of her Privy Council a respectful silence reigned
even in the inner courtyard of the palace, otherwise so full of
animation. This council was the brain of Margaret's govern-

161

1 62 The Chess Player

merit, and it was made up principally of old associates of hers
who had followed her from Savoy to the Netherlands.

From the President of the Council, Gattinara, a thor-
oughly schooled government official, Margaret learned the
practical technique that every head of a great office must
command. In Savoy her occupations had been limited, and
her chancery had been able to permit itself a certain dilet-
tantism; but this was no longer possible in the Netherlands.
Thus the Regent learned never to sign any letter that she had
not read through, and to set up a copybook of outgoing
letters, so that, particularly in her correspondence with the
Emperor, she should not contradict herself. And when upon
occasion in letters to her father she showed her feelings too
clearly, her secretaries took care that such impolitic effusions
were not sent out. A letter has been preserved from the first
years of her regency, when its cares seemed insurmountable
and revolt threatened even in the Low Countries; a pathetic
letter in which her solicitous secretary, Marnix, replaced
Margaret's despairing words by more measured terms. For
could one allow the Regent to confess that she was mortally
afraid at the angry words of her people? Or that she had
incurred debts in order to cover expenditures? Or that she
dreaded lest her worries make her sick? Or that she should
express her sensation of helplessness by saying that many
times she wished herself back in the womb of her mother
"et vouldroie maintes fois estre au ventre de ma mere"?

At first there may have been frequent alterations in the
routine of Margaret's chancery, but in later years its activi-
ties were regulated by fixed prescription. Twice a week at
two o'clock in the afternoon the Privy Council, which con-
sisted of some twelve members, met in a special room of the

Notre Bonne Tante

Court of Savoy in the presence of the Regent. All affairs to
be dealt with were first submitted for Madame's judgment.
In legal matters it was the decision of the whole Council that
stood; but when mercy was to be exercised the Council
simply laid its advice before the Regent and left the verdict
to her discrimination.

Every Saturday afternoon the secretaries handed over the
decisions they had formulated to President Gattinara, who
set the Regent's seal upon them. Thereafter the document
was inscribed and finally signed by Margaret herself. Urgent
affairs and secret political correspondence were entrusted
to one of her secretaries who enjoyed her full confidence.
And if in very special circumstances she did not wish to in-
form even her most devoted associates of her plans, she
wrote her letters in her own hand, in that rapid and intelli-
gent script which even in moments of discouragement re-
tained its strength and resilience.

Certain members of the Privy Council formed a Financial
Commission "les gens des Finances" who handled Mar-
garet's private revenue from her Spanish and Savoyard
dowers and controlled its expenditure. The commission had
a separate office in the palace at Malines, and whenever the
Regent journeyed elsewhere for a short time there appeared
among her baggage two heavily ironbound trunks, which
contained the papers relative to the financial management
of her household.

The house "la Maison de Madame" included that entire
world of councilors, secretaries and clerks, clerics and artists,
ladies and gentlemen in waiting, maids of honor and pages,
with their personal servants and the domestic staff, who
throughout the day filled the establishment with a colorful

/ 64 The Chess flayer

activity. Of the approximately 150 persons who formed the
daily entourage of the Regent only a few lived in the palace.
The rest were housed in the city, and when early in the
morning the heavy gate that gave on the Keizerstraat was
opened, the captain of the watch checked with great punctil-
iousness the horde of clerks and servants that already
thronged the street, waiting to be let in.

From nine o'clock on, when the personnel went to its
daily work, until the moment when the porter made the
rounds of all offices to announce that closing time had come,
a lively bustle filled the inner courtyard. Mounted messen-
gers rode in and out, heavily laden carts came rolling across
the pavement, and through the open doors of the service
quarters one could see bakers, poulterers, and butchers at
their work, while in the kitchens the fires were being laid and
lit

It was customary for the personnel that lived outside to
take their midday meal in the palace, so that the archducal
household had to handle a table d'hote of 150 persons after
twelve o'clock noon. They did not all sit down to table at
the same time, but in groups constituted according to strict-
est etiquette. The table at which one ate "le plat", as it was
termed was the measure of dignity at the court of the
Regent of the Netherlands, as at all ruling courts.

Madame went first to table, in company with her Grand
Mistress. If royal guests were present or ambassadors from
foreign powers who deserved this honor as representatives
of their masters, they sat down with the Regent. "Le plat de
Madame" had first choice from the elaborate menu, which
consisted largely of meat dishes and game, with pastries

Notre Bonne Tante 165

("oublies"), fruit, and cheese to follow. Plates were seldom
used, forks not at all, and for this reason bread was a very-
important aid. The regulations of 1 5 2 5 for "les plats de 1'hotel
de Madame" prescribe that at her midday meal she should
receive four rolls to eat ("pains de bouche") and six pieces of
brown bread for plates ("pour ses assietes") . Her Grand Mis-
tress, however, had to do with less. For her were prescribed
one pain de bouche and one plate of brown bread ("une
assiete de pain bis")*

What remained of Madame's dinner was eaten by the
nobles on duty, the "maitres d'hotel", as they were called,
after they had first served the meal of their mistress. Upon
this followed a "plat" for the ladies in waiting, one for the
maids and female servants of the Grand Mistress, and one for
the keepers of the wardrobe, who ate simultaneously but at
different tables. And after that all sorts of people had their
turn, valets, porters, clerks, menservants, the tailor, and the
drummer.

With this prescribed hierarchy no interference was
brooked, and if certain nobles sometimes took the liberty of
having a table set up in their own quarters, they were pun-
ished with "1'indignacion de Madame" and were suspended
from their functions for one month.

The same strict household etiquette prescribed that the
gentlemen in waiting themselves should serve Madame and
should not leave this task to their assistants, unless they were
ill or had leave of absence. The baker must make the pastry
for Madame with his own hands and himself bring it to the
kitchens. If he sent it by a boy, the chief cook must refuse to
receive it. Nor could the valets on watch in the private apart-

1 66 The Chess flayer

ments of the Regent leave their duty to a lesser servant if
Madame wished to retire, or eat alone in her room, or if she
was not dressed or felt indisposed.

"La Chambre de Madame" this was the sanctuary to
which only a few privileged persons penetrated, where
Margaret found rest and refreshment after the fatiguing
burdens of her rule. Entering here, she, around whose heart
the loneliness of her office and her widowhood often seemed
to draw an iron band, was no longer alone. There were al-
ways the dogs, who sprang up from the white cloth cushions
in the corners of the room to greet her with wagging of tails.
The guinea pig she had once bought from a Frenchman for
not less than ten pounds came nuzzling for her caresses. The
green parrot whistled in coaxing tones from his great cage,
and from a spacious aviary came a continual piping and flut-
tering of the other little birds that were in the chamber of
my lady "aultres oyseletz estans en la chambre de madite
dame".

The creatures were Margaret's comfort. Their depend-
ence, their need for affection, filled a void of which she was
often bitterly aware. Their playful unconcern could bring
back her laughter, which amid all her problems she was in
danger of forgetting. She was grateful for their gratitude,
and found time to look after them in the midst of her most
pressing business. And with tender patience she would lay
the green cloth over the bird cages when sometimes the twit-
tering disturbed her too much.

Before the wood fire in her bedroom with its green taffeta
hangings, or in the stately luxury of her "librarye", where
ancestral and family portraits hung between the lecterns
with precious manuscripts, Margaret forgot her daily care,

Notre Bonne Xante i6j

losing herself in ancient romances, the works of the classic
writers, the lives of the saints. On the blue and yellow
damask walls of her sitting room hung the paintings that
time and again brought her delight, the luminous tenderness
of Jan van Eyck, the worldly graciousness of Memlinc, the
piety of Rogier van der Weyden, the disturbing fantasies of
Hieronimus Bosch. When in the intimacy of her writing
room she sat in the black velvet seat at her ivory writing case
to busy herself with her private correspondence, the heaviest
cares fell from her in the atmosphere of this little museum.
And then she would invite her Grand Mistress or one of her
ladies in waiting, and would take from the cupboard the old
painted box with the chess game of chalcedony and jasper
"de casydoine et de jaspe" or perhaps the silver chessboard
with the silver and gilt pieces. Then silence reigned in
Madame's cabinet, among the rich tapestries. And with
cautious movements, lest the wide ermine sleeves of her black
velvet tabard disturb the positions of the game, her dark
eyes in her pale nun's face fixed in tense concentration on
the priceless figures, Madame would play the game of perspi-
cacity and calculation that was so closely related to her polit-
ical activity in the world of Europe, of which she could now,
by a single move, influence the future.

But the pieces in the European game were not of jasper
nor of silver. What Margaret manipulated with the same
circumspect moves in this chess tournament were the lives
of the three little girls who lived with their brother, Mon-
seigneur the Archduke of Austria, in the old imperial palace
opposite the Court of Savoy. Monseigneur himself, the pale,
slender boy with the sleepy little face, was, as future head
of the House of Habsburg-Burgundy, the most important

1 68 The Chess Player

piece in the game; he must be most circumspectly handled
and in his service the defenseless little pawns, "Alienor,
Ysabeau, Marie", might be sacrificed if necessary.

In Margaret of York's modest little palace in the narrow
Keizerstraat, close by the bastions of Malines, the four chil-
dren, "our Malines descendants" "nostre lignaige de Ma-
lines" as their grandfather Maximilian called them, lived
in a conventual seclusion. The fact that their aunt, the Dow-
ager Duchess of Savoy, came to occupy the building oppo-
site their palace seemed at first to have scarcely any effect on
the imperturbable uniformity of their lives. On their parents'
departure for Spain they had been confided to the care of
Anna de Beaumont, one of their mother's Spanish ladies in
waiting who, already at the birth of the heir to the throne,
had taken over the task of the melancholic Archduchess
Juana. She was at the same time Grand Mistress of the House
to the royal children, for although they were still in the care
of nurses and "cradle rockers", Alienor and Charles, Ysabeau
and Marie lived in royal state and their court was conducted
according to the same protocol that was in force in Mar-
garet's establishment.

But the two eldest in particular, Alienor and Charles, were
soon to notice that with the coming of their aunt something
in their lives really had changed. Margaret, who had known
only the sorrows of motherhood, bent over the little orphans
who were the future of her House with a protective tender-
ness. Their sicknesses, the measles and die much-dreaded
smallpox, gave her anxious days in the midst of her problems
during those first years of her rule, and her letters to her
father are full of solicitous reports about his grandchildren.
She seldom took a decision without consulting Maximilian,

Notre Bonne Xante 169

and he on his side showed a boundless interest and concern
for his grandson and the little princesses, whom in his awk-
ward French he was accustomed to allude to as his "very
dear little girls" "noz petites et tres chieres filles". In the
midst of his endless campaigns, in encampments before the
walls of beleaguered cities, scarcely recovered from some
exciting battle, Maximilian takes pen in hand to warn his
daughter that she must not admit to the presence of Mon-
seigneur a doctor who belongs to the much-hated and dan-
gerous Venetian people; or to express his joy that young
Charles is making such good progress in the noble sport of
hunting for were this not so, writes the Emperor, it might
be thought that the boy was a bastard and not the real grand-
child of his grandfather, the hunter par excellence.

Maximilian did not need to fear, in any case, that his
daughter would not watch over the royal children as over
her most precious possession. He knew that she, like him-
self, had only one aim left in life: the greatness of the House
of Habsburg, a greatness that was dependent upon the future
of these children.

With the passing of the years Margaret's attachment to
her foster children grew. When in 1511 the war with Gel-
derland claimed all her attention and she went to inspect the
troops that were going to fight the rebel in the north, she left
her pupils behind in Malines with great concern. She had
enjoined upon the governors of this faithful city that they
must take particular care during her absence that nothing
should happen to the children, she wrote to her father, for
nowadays one did not know on whom one could rely "car
aujorduy Ton ne scet en cuy Ton se doit fier". Margaret
knew too well the political methods of her contemporaries

2 jo The Chess Player

not to fear for her children, for Charles, in whom they al-
ready dreaded the prospective ruler over two continents, for
the little princesses who would one day divide between them
the disposable crowns of Europe and would make Margaret
"bonne tante" to practically all the ruling houses. Trembling
for her precious charges, Margaret left Malines, and was not
at rest until she had returned and found that no incident had
disturbed the peace of the imperial court.

With the same care that she expended on the present of
her foster children, Margaret attempted to prepare their
future. She who herself had been the victim of that cus-
tom of her time which a French historian has rightly called
"a trade in princesses" "traite de princesses", proved to be a
good pupil of Maximilian, whose policy was always based on
marriage, his own and that of others. It seemed as though the
Regent had forgotten what the woman had suffered, and the
terms in which Margaret corresponded with her father about
the alliances of her small nieces leave nothing to be desired in
cruel directness.

Already in 1509 the Dowager Queen of Portugal had ap-
proached Margaret with the proposition that the young son
of the reigning Portuguese king should marry her eldest
foster child, Madame Alienor, with whom he would match
very well in age the children were both ten years old or
perhaps Madame Ysabeau who, however, was only just
turned eight. Furthermore they might also negotiate a mar-
riage between Madame Marie and one of the other young
sons of the king, who, Margaret wrote to Maximilian, "I
understand has three or four". "Monseigneur", she added,
"in view of the small number of princes at present alive, and

Notre Bonne Tante 271

the wealth of the King of Portugal, I believe it would be
sensible to conclude one of these two marriages, or both, if
you agree, and you would still have two of my lady nieces
to make another alliance elsewhere" "et encoires aures
deux de mesdames mes niepces pour en faire allieurs autre
allience".

Nothing came of these intentions, however. For the Em-
peror already had other plans for little Mary, and in her
seventh year she was actually betrothed to the Crown Prince
of Bohemia and Hungary. The little princess Alienor, it is
true, was still available, but Maximilian wanted to postpone
the move he intended to make with this eldest granddaughter
for very well-considered reasons. The good "grandfather of
Austria" possessed four granddaughters and herein foresaw
the possibility that one day, if heaven still granted him a
number of years, all heirs to European thrones would call
him great-grandfather. There were three crowns from
among which he wished to choose for Alienor: those of
France, England, and Poland. But alas, at the moment they
still adorned three other female heads and therefore grand-
father Maximilian could not decide about Alienor's future
until one of these three queens should have exchanged the
temporal for the eternal. Thus for the time being there could
be no question of a Portuguese marriage.

Madame Ysabeau, however, who in 1509 was in any case
too young to be reserved for the French or English widower-
in-spe, was nevertheless married off a few years later to a
ruler twenty-two years older than she: Christian II, King
of Denmark, Sweden, and Norway.

Christian had given his emissary the commission in the
first place to sue for the hand of Alienor, and only if that did

1*12 The Chess Player . .

not appear possible to ask the younger princess Ysabeau in
marriage. Since Alienor was waiting for the sound of the
funeral bells for the queen of either France or England, it
was in fact her thirteen-year-old sister who had to pay with
her happiness, even with her life, for Maximilian's marriage
policy.

After Christian's representatives had asked Maximilian
for the hand of his granddaughter they departed for Brussels,
where the Regent of the Netherlands was staying. And when
the necessary formalities had been carried out, the ambassa-
dors requested that the marriage should be performed by
proxy on the following day, a Sunday, since their master,
King Christian, was then celebrating the anniversary of his
coronation.

To stage a royal wedding ceremony within twenty-four
hours was no simple task, and Margaret furthermore feared
lest the honor of the House be not fully and properly com-
plied with. But she also understood the importance for the
future if Christian's coronation day coincided with his
wedding day.

The following morning the ceremony was carried out in
the great hall of the palace in Brussels, and with motherly
pride Margaret reported to the Emperor the details of the
marriage of Ysabeau, her niece, who was certainly good to
look at "ma niepce, laquelle certes il faisoit bon veoir".

Anxiously brief though the time for preparation had been,
the imperial honor had not suffered. The foreign ambassa-
dors had been given their rightful places at dinner, to the
satisfaction of all concerned, and after the gala supper there
had been dancing in expectation of the symbolic ceremony
that would end the day. Like her Aunt Margaret before her,

Notre Bonne Tante 773

the thirteen-year-old "dame des nopces" had stretched her-
self upon a bed of state and the ambassador of King Christian
had laid himself down beside her, one leg bared, as was cus-
tomary among great princes "comme il est accoustume
f aire entre grands princes".

Her grandfather might be convinced that her marriage
with "the Nero of the North" would bring honor and ad-
vantage to the House of Habsburg and be welcome to the
Burgundians through the good commercial relations it would
create; to the little blue-eyed princess it brought only the
bitterest suffering, the most cruel humiliation. When at the
age of fifteen the little Queen made her entry at the court
of Copenhagen, she discovered that her husband, her senior
by twenty-two years, whose wild leonine appearance terri-
fied her, was the slave of two women, mother and daughter,
of Netherlands origin. They were Duiveke, his mistress, and
her mother Siegebritte Willems, the real ruler of Scandi-
navia. How should Ysabeau, timid and gentle child that she
was, have been able to win a place for herself in this atmos-
phere?

The degrading treatment meted out to his grandchild was
not concealed from the Emperor, and he sent a special envoy
to Copenhagen to make Christian see the error of his ways.
But the fate of the little Queen was not improved by the fact
that her husband, his fists clenched in anger, had to listen
to the truth in a lecture from an imperial ambassador. Even
the death of the royal mistress, Duiveke, brought no amelio-
ration for Ysabeau. Her first born, Crown Prince Johan, was
taken from her by Christian to be brought up by Siegebritte.
Powerless to stand up for her most elementary rights, Ysa-
beau pined away in loneliness and mortification.

The Chess Player

Those who were finally to take her part only increased
her sorrows. In the spring of 1523 Christian's subjects re-
belled against the disgraceful regime of Siegebritte, protest-
ing against the shame brought upon their innocent Queen.
Jutland and Sweden revolted, and the Danish nobility even
went so far as to depose the King.

Had the gentle Ysabeau possessed the character of her
aunt, the Regent of the Netherlands, she could undoubtedly
have taken the government of the Scandinavian kingdoms
into her own hands in the name of her small son. But Ysa-
beau, will-less and broken, no longer had the strength to be
independent, and she followed her husband into exile. Their
flight brought them with their children to the Netherlands,
where Ysabeau found protection and comfort with her Aunt
Margaret and where her husband hoped to find support from
his brother-in-law Charles, the mightiest ruler in Europe,
who since 1519 had been Emperor of the Holy Roman
Empire*

But Margaret was unable to do much more for her un-
fortunate young niece, whose delicate health had been de-
stroyed through anxiety and humiliation, whose resistance
had been broken by years of loneliness. She languished and
died in the land where, under the care of her good aunt, the
few happy years of her brief life had been spent.

After the tragic death of the Queen of Denmark disturb-
ing rumors went the rounds of Europe. It was whispered that
the young Queen, sister of the Emperor himself, under
pressure from her husband had become converted to the
abominable heresies of Martin Luther, of whom Christian

Notre Bonne Tante 775

was a follower. What would happen to Ysabeau's children?
Was there really a possibility that the nephew and nieces of
the Emperor might be lost to the true faith and become
weapons in the fight which the disaffected German princes
were carrying on against him?

Christian understood to the full the significance his chil-
dren could have for his brother-in-law, the Defender of the
Church, and no one more clearly realized this fact than the
Regent of the Netherlands. After endless negotiations,
which Christian repeatedly tried to escape by fleeing with
his precious children to Germany, Margaret finally suc-
ceeded in literally buying the little prince and the two little
princesses from their father. She paid Christian's debts and
granted him a yearly stipend of fifteen hundred guilders, in
return for which she acquired the right to take Ysabeau's
children to live with her and be brought up under her guid-
ance. Now again Margaret took pity on three deserted
youngsters, once more the voices of children resounded in
the halls of the old palace.

Before poor Ysabeau had gone to meet her fate, her
younger sister, the Archduchess Mary, had already left the
familiar surroundings of Malines as the bride of the Crown
Prince of Bohemia and Hungary, to find a future in the most
easterly outpost of Christian Europe. After her young hus-
band had lost his life in the war with the Turks, she too was
to return to the Low Countries, whither her brother, the
Emperor, called her in 153 1 to succeed her Aunt Margaret.
Beside the frail Ysabeau in her tragic submissiveness, her
sister Mary appears like a strong blond amazon in the history

The Chess Player

of the Netherlands: a woman who had the strength to be
herself in a world that sought to use her and her kind simply
as instruments of policy.

In the summer of 1516 only the two eldest children of
Philip the Handsome and Juana of Aragon remained behind
in the Netherlands. The harmonious atmosphere of the
"Keizerhof", where they had spent their youthful years in
the charge of their "Tame et Bonne Mere", had in more than
one respect been broken up, and not alone through the de-
parture of the two princesses. Between Monseigneur the
Archduke Charles, who in January, 1515, had been declared
of age, and the woman who for years had worked for his
future according to the best of her knowledge, a wall of
suspicion and jealousy had risen, built of thwarted ambition
and an urge for independence. What Margaret had sensed at
the beginning of her regime had become a fact: her foster son
had turned away from her under the influence of the nation-
alist Burgundian nobles and of his tutor Chievres, to whom
he clung with boyish devotion.

When Margaret took up her office in the Netherlands in
1507 she had immediately been aware of opposition from
the man whom her brother Philip had appointed governor
of the Burgundian provinces upon his departure for Spain:
William of Croy, Sieur de Chievres. He was at this time
already forty-nine years old, a considerable age in those days
for a statesman who had until this moment been little to the
fore. His family tradition made him the leader of the French-
minded nationalists at the Burgundian court, of the feudal
nobility that was always ready to oppose the centralizing
authority of the dukes, and especially where this authority

Musee 'Royal des Beaux Arts,

Margaret of Austria, by Barend van Orley.

Cnaitlime Jtaim,

Charles V as a Boy, by Conrad Meit

Notre Bonne Tmte 777

had, through the marriage of Mary, the last Burgundian
ruler, come into the hands of the House of Habsburg, which
in Netherlands eyes always represented foreign interests.

Thus Margaret, who before all wished to serve the future
of her dynasty and who in her personal life had had the worst
experiences with the French royal house, promptly found
herself opposite this man who feared her rule would cause
the end of his own political objectives and whom the death
of Philip the Handsome had deprived of his office of Gov-
ernor.

But it appeared that Margaret was not willing to be exclu-
sively her father's tool. Her insight into the demands of real-
ity speedily convinced her that her country needed peace
with France as well as with England. She set herself to make
her influence a factor of balance between the two great
powers that were her neighbors. And her rapprochement
with France, which took shape in the League of Cambrai,
signified at the same time a rapprochement with the opposi-
tion in the Netherlands, with Chievres himself, who shortly
after Margaret's triumph was appointed first chamberlain
and tutor to Monseigneur Charles.

For the development of the prospective ruler of the Span-
ish-German world empire the politically inspired choice of
Chievres was extraordinarily fortunate. For Charles's char-
acter bore the stigma of an inner discord which caused him
always to vacillate between the somewhat indolent passivity
that seemed to be his most common characteristic in child-
hood and the sudden flashes of impatience which, according
to the perspicacious Venetian ambassador Quirino, made
him resemble Charles the Bold of Burgundy. His childish
moods alternated between a sleepy apathy and fits of tern-

The Chess Player

per which made him wholly uncontrollable. His physique
seemed still further to accentuate this incongruity. The
hereditary peculiarity displayed in his prominent lower jaw
hindered him in his speech, and this defect was aggravated
by his short thick tongue, which made articulation difficult.
In repose Monseigneur's too pale, too long and narrow face
with the always open mouth and the eyes which, as a spiteful
ambassador remarked, looked as if they had been stuck on
and did not belong to him, sometimes caused his entourage
to fear that this heir to the imperial throne was neither men-
tally nor physically equal to his great task.

The contradiction in Charles's nature found in the ripe
wisdom of his tutor the support he needed to help him out-
grow the threat of a lasting inner disharmony. Chievres, for
whom even the sharp pens of foreign diplomats found only
kind words and whom they characterized as gentle and kind,
surrounded his pupil with that unflagging and yet respectful
affection necessary to overcome ^Charles's uncertainty and to
use the contradictory tendencies in his character. And
though Chievres knew that the Regent was still not entirely
won over, so that there always remained that contrast be-
tween their views which was one day to end in a total break,
he could but appreciate her wholehearted devotion to the
interests of Monseigneur. He shared her anxious concern for
their charge's feeble health, and his letters to her are full of
details about the boy's life. He has a pain in his leg, but when
the doctors come whom Chievres hastily summoned, he
suddenly feels better. He is indisposed and goes early to bed,
but next day he is gay again and goes with the princesses at
midday to the Count of Nassau, who had prepared a veri-
table feast for his young guests, and the prince has suffered

Notre Bonne Xante

no harm as a result. The Regent often passes these reports
on to Grandfather Maximilian, and when Monseigneur the
Archduke has danced too long at the marriage feast of his
sister Ysabeau and is obliged to stay in bed next day with
a temperature, daily couriers hasten through Europe with
letters from Margaret, because even a slight illness in the
person of such a prince gives one cause to think "pour ce
que, en la personne d'ung tel prince ne peult avoir si petite
maladie, qui ne f asse bien a penser". The future of the House
depended on this, alas, rather weak boy and Margaret had
seen stronger young princes removed from the scene by
sudden fevers. And when Monseigneur is well again after
ten days his aunt hastens to announce the fact to the Emperor
in order to relieve him of all anxiety "pour vous mectre
hors de toute melancholic", as she writes.

So Charles grew up under the care of his aunt and the
sympathetic and enlightened guidance of his kind and ami-
able tutor. Though still a child, he was treated as the real
sovereign, and therefore also he was included as much as
possible in all ceremonies at which his aunt appeared as his
representative. She knew she was only the servant of his
future, and once when she showed the young Archduke to
a number of officers who were leaving for the war in Gelder-
land, she exclaimed with truly feudal pride: "Gentlemen,
see for whom you take up arms!" "Messieurs, voyez pour
qui vous prenez les armes! "

So long as the League of Cambrai preserved the appear-
ance of harmony between France and Habsburg-Burgundy,
the struggle between the Regent and the tutor of Monsei-
gneur consisted merely of hurt feelings and politely disguised
unpleasant remarks. But it was sharpened when Margaret

iSo The Chess flayer

felt that the time had come to sacrifice this creation of hers
for that other combination, more in accord with her personal
preference, namely, the League of Malines, between the
Emperor, Henry VIII of England, Ferdinand of Aragon,
and the Pope. This mighty coalition was clearly directed
against France, the country that at heart she still considered
as the natural enemy of Burgundy and Habsburg, since it had
always threatened the safety of Monseigneur's Low Coun-
tries and laid claim to Naples and Sicily, to Monseigneur's
Spanish inheritance, and to Milan, border territory of the
Austrian lands. Thus politically the Regent found herself
once more in conflict with Chievres, while on the other hand
she saw his influence on young Charles increasing daily.

In the beginning it looked as if Margaret would emerge
victorious from this struggle. The year 1513 saw her at the
apex of her career. This seemed to be the moment when
France should be rendered powerless for good. Henry VIII,
young and wealthy, longed to dazzle Europe by the bril-
liance of his exploits. The title of King of France he could
merely dig up from the treasuries of English royal tradition,
and Margaret did not grudge the vain young fellow, who
was in a position to give the Emperor subsidies to support
the Netherlands in the war against Gelderland, this high-
sounding if somewhat insubstantial satisfaction. Henry
might call himself whatever he chose, it was more important
that he crossed the channel with an impressive and well-paid
army to put Margaret's theory into practice. And that
Henry turned his expedition into a demonstration of his own
splendor could only add luster to the common cause. Power
must be visible and audible. Therefore the sails of Henry's
ship were of cloth of gold, and they sparkled in the summer

Notre Bonne Tante 181

sun above the light-green, white-foaming water. A fleet of
small cargo boats, laden with the costly trappings that
Henry considered necessary for this his first European ap-
pearance, sailed ahead of the royal flagship.

The Emperor decided to go in person to bask in the glow
shed by his "son" of England with his golden hair and his
iingling gold pieces. And his daughter, seeing her dearest
wish fulfilled a meeting between her ally and her father
ioyfully declared in one of her letters that this made her
happier than anything that could have befallen her in this

wor j ( j "j'ay este si joieuse que de chose qui m'eust sceu

advenir en ce monde".

Gray-haired Maximilian appeared on the scene of battle
like a legendary king. Without an army, accompanied only
by a small suite, he had traveled north in rapid day journeys.
There at Guinegate, a battlefield where as a young and
radiant bridegroom he had achieved his first victory against
the arch-enemies of the House of Burgundy, he suddenly
appeared, bareheaded and mysterious, in the midst of the
German mercenaries the English king had taken into his
service. Those who did not recognize him by the graying
hair that flowed down to his shoulders, grasped the truth
when they saw the imperial standard, a black eagle on a gold
ground waving against the blue of the summer sky. The
Emperor himself! A joyous cry of "Long live the Emperor! "
went through the German ranks. The English took it over
and the French, who heard the shouts" and recognized the
standard, could hardly believe their eyes and ears. The Em-
peror himself!

The French were put to flight. Therouanne was taken.
The cannon founded in Malines, affectionately called "the

The Chess Player

twelve apostles of King Henry", bombarded Tournai. The
city capitulated. The combined English and German arms
seemed to be blessed by divine favor, but not so the English-
German friendship for which Margaret had hoped. Like a
condottiere without an army, the Emperor had put himself
at the command of his "son", the English King, and thus
the head of Christendom stood subservient to a young ruler
who ought to have ranked beneath him. The English sub-
sidies paid to Maximilian made it appear that the Emperor
of the Holy Roman Empire was accepting pay from Henry
and countless spiteful insinuations went the rounds. And
Henry, with his resounding title of King of France, had him-
self acclaimed in Tournai by his new subjects in total dis-
regard of the wishes of his grizzled brother-in-arms, who
would gladly have added that city to Burgundy.

Once again Maximilian remembered the diplomatic talent
of his daughter, and he requested her to come and greet the
English king at Tournai. Margaret, for whatever reasons,
made certain objections to this plan. If her father thought
that she could be of service to him by coming, she was pre-
pared to do whatever he wished, but otherwise it was not
for a widowed woman to trot about visiting armies for pleas-
ure, this thirty-three-year-old widow felt "mais sans cella
ce n'est le cas de f emme vef ve de troter et aller visiter arm6es
pour le plesir". But Maximilian's will was her law, and at the
end of September the Regent traveled to Tournai in the
company of numerous ladies in waiting and damoiselles, who
on their side cannot have taken the objections of their mis-
tress too seriously. All Europe was talking of the gallant
English king, of the brilliance of his court festivities, the
lavishness of his hospitality, the good looks of his young

Notre Bonne Tante 183

English officers. Margaret's ladies had nothing against "trot-
ting about visiting armies for pleasure".

Nor had they expected too much from their trip. Never
before had Tournai, accustomed to the luxury of its rich
merchants, looked upon so much wealth as in those sunny
September days of 1513 when the Emperor, the King of
England "and France", the Regent of the Netherlands, and
the Archduke of Austria gathered inside its walls. For the
thirteen-year-old Charles had followed his aunt, and the
serious pale boy was the center of all attention, more even
than Maximilian, who purposely withdrew from the showy
exhibition, more even than Henry VIII himself, who, in his
crackling golden-yellow satin, his plumed bonnet on his
round blond head, rode ostentatiously through the streets
of defeated Tournai upon a charger jingling with gold chains
and little silver bells. In the slight figure of the young Arch-
duke, dressed in plain dark velvet, the people saw the future
ruler over ten kingdoms, over two world empires, and the
trumpets that announced his arrival created a silence more
impressive than all Henry's barbaric clatter.

Although she still did not exchange her widow's cap for
any more worldly headdress even on these very festive days,
the Regent of the Netherlands did appear at Henry's luxu-
rious feasts in richer dress than had been her custom of recent
years. With all the tact at her command she sought to restore
the harmony that Maximilian had not been able to preserve,
and her brocade tabards, her priceless jewels, the elegance
of her ladies in waiting, were so many weapons on her side
in this battle of ingratiation. It cost Margaret no effort to
enchant her young and easily flattered host. She, who had
loved Philibert the Handsome for his blond youth, knew

184 The Chess Player

by nature what the twenty-two-year-old Henry would
like to hear from the lips of a witty and attractive woman.
And the young Englishmen accompanying the King dis-
covered that the Regent could smile most endearingly,
though they understood nothing of the rapid French of her
quips and jests.

One of them, the Master of the Horse Charles Brandon,
surrounded her in these days with daring attentions which
the jovial Henry loudly applauded and which Margaret
accepted with amused indulgence. One evening, after sup-
per, when Henry in Margaret's presence encouraged his
enamored friend to go ahead and ask the charming Regent
in marriage, the seductive Charles knelt at her feet and took
from her one of her rings.

"Thief!" Margaret joked with a smile to Henry, who was
gleefully watching this scene. But Brandon understood no
French and one of the Flemish ladies in waiting had to be
called to make clear to him that Madame had scolded him for
a thief. Despite Margaret's protest that the ring was too well
known, Brandon kept it until Margaret, not wishing to be-
come seriously angry lest she spoil Henry's childish pleasure,
had given him another ring instead.

The little scene had not escaped the all-seeing eyes of the
courtiers and the rumor that Madame had at last decided
to bid her widow's weeds farewell made a sensation of the
first order in international society. And this for the sake of
Brandon, the son, it was whispered, of Henry's nurse!

Though Margaret had still frequently to combat this
persistent rumor, she had not in vain used her charms in sup-
port of her politics. Henry VIII had forgotten his annoyance
with Maximilian, and after Margaret had invited him to leave

Notre Bonne T&nte

his "kingdom" to be her guest in Lille, she was able to win
him over to the extent of signing a treaty that fell in with
her own political wishes. Money for the upkeep of troops
during the winter, agreement to a second attack on France
in the coming year and to a new meeting with Maximilian
and Margaret to celebrate the marriage between Archduke
Charles and Henry's sister, Mary Tudor Madame had only
to mention these things and Henry agreed.

Margaret's fame as a diplomat was more brilliant than
ever. Yet now a new turn of the fateful wheel of fortune
was to bring her, after these triumphs, the bitterest disap-
pointments.

Tousjour loyal, quoy que advienne,
En tout et partout rhomme doit estre,
Tant soit il seculier ou prestre;
Droit dit que loyalte Ton tienne.

Dieu veult, certes, qu'on s'entretienne,
En fortune bonne ou senestre,
Tousjour loyal.

Pouser le cas qui mesavienne
Et que le tout ne vient a dextre,
Je ne scay mieux du monde en Festre
Pour I'homme, f ors qu'i se mentienne
Tousjour loyal.

Always loyal, whatever comes,
In all and everywhere man must be,
Whether secular or priest;
Right bids one to keep loyalty.

God wills, for sure, that we remain,
In fortune good or sinister,
Always loyal.

Suppose the case of misadventure
Where all does not come right, I know
Nothing better in the world
For man than to maintain himself
Always loyal.

CHAPTER SEVEN

The Roman Crown

THE triumphant days in Tournai and Lille, when Mar-
garet had managed to leave her stamp on the future of
Europe's international politics, appeared to have given her
some of the overboldness characteristic of the young Kong of
England. In Lille she had succeeded in all her efforts, and
these achievements in foreign fields seemed to have blinded
her to the serious problems of her domestic government,
which, as the years went by, had become more and more
threatening.

While she possessed really sovereign power, Monseigneur
the Archduke Charles, living opposite her in Malines in the
"Keizerhof ", which resembled a cloister rather than a royal
residence, would in the near future be taking over that power
from her. Those who sought to play a role at Margaret's
court, to set their mark on men and events, to capture their
share of the power over which Monseigneur would one day
have control, looked upon the young Archduke as the future
itself. Whoever controlled Charles had the fate of Europe in
his hands. Whomever Charles wished to follow, two con-
tinents would obey.

187

i8S The Chess Player

Hence behind the scenes of that feudal stage on which
Charles lived his life of a sovereign-to-be, a struggle was
being waged for the possession of this boy, and the parties
to it were the same that were fighting each other in the great
European tournament: France, Spain and the Habsburgs,
England and Burgundy. Between them stood the Regent,
Burgundian by birth, Habsburg in her politics, related to
Spain and materially dependent on Ferdinand's favor, feared
by France and for economic and traditional reason allied
with England. And still the one plea of her subjects was for
peace.

For a short time at least the Treaty of Cambrai had estab-
lished a balance between the contending interests. The
House of Habsburg ruled over Monseigneur and his Low
Countries in the person of the Regent. France was pacified.
Chievres, leader of the Burgundian national party, occupied
the most important function of tutor to the prince. He
shared his apartments, even his bedroom. Though his influ-
ence was subordinate to that of Madame, it was Chievres
who was molding the still formless character of Monseigneur
to the shape he thought best for him. In Spain, Ferdinand
was for the moment satisfied with the regency of Castile.
Relations with England had been settled by the betrothal
of Archduke Charles to Princess Mary Tudor, sister of
Henry VIII.

But this treaty had been only a temporary arrangement.
It was shipwrecked on its own success and the Holy
League between the Pope, Aragon, and Venice against Louis
XII was the result. Nor did this Holy League survive success.
Venice deserted her allies and joined with France once more.
It was at this moment, in the spring of 1513, that Margaret

The Roman Crown 189

considered the time ripe for dealing Louis a crushing blow.
After the victories of her English ally it also seemed to her
a good moment to restrict the French influence in her own
government, to eliminate it if possible. Chievres, Charles's
tutor, must be rendered powerless.

His party carried on a strong opposition to Margaret's
politics, particularly since she had taken up with greater
energy the struggle against that outpost of France, Charles
of Gelre. It consisted of the Burgundian feudal lords who
saw in Margaret primarily the representative of alien Habs-
burg, and who looked forward eagerly to the moment when
Archduke Charles should be declared of age and freed from
the regency of his grandfather and his aunt. Margaret knew
that this moment was very near: according to Burgundian
custom, on the fifteenth birthday of the young ruler. The
more necessary was it therefore to remove him beforehand
from the pro-French, anti-Habsburg influences of Chievres
and his followers, to win him over definitely for her own
policy, so that Charles should continue even after his eman-
cipation in the direction that Margaret wished to select for
him.

Her meeting with the young and triumphant Henry VIII
presented her with a means of undermining Chievres' au-
thority without removing him from office. She had a new or-
dinance drawn up concerning the "gouvernement de la
personne" of the young Archduke because, as she wrote
Maximilian, the King of Aragon had complained that he had
no way of exerting any influence on the boy for whom he
was conducting the regency in Castile. To meet this legiti-
mate objection it was now decided that the Emperor, the
King of Aragon, and the King of England should each ap-

290 The Chess Player

point a good man "ung bon personnaige" who should
be given the competency of a first lord in waiting at Charles's
court and for this purpose should dispose of a key to the
archducal apartments. One of them should sleep, together
with Chievres, in Charles's bedroom. The trio should, more-
over, attend all private meetings of the Council in short, no
single detail of Charles's private life and of the actions of his
government should remain unknown to them.

This ordinance, published in the presence of Henry VIII
in Lille, meant practically the elimination of Chievres, whose
party thereupon made indignant protests to Maximilian. But
the Regent stood her ground. She had not yet completed the
execution of her program for protecting her authority over
Monseigneur. Still other influences working against her
policy must be removed.

Besides the friendship with England, Margaret's efforts
in recent years for a better understanding between the two
grandfathers of her pupil, Ferdinand of Aragon and the
Emperor, had apparently met with success. But Ferdinand
had been the first to withdraw, through Pope Julius II, from
the League of Cambrai. And although he was included in
Margaret's plan for an international attack on Louis XII, it
was a question whether he would in 15 14 be willing to sup-
port the Habsburg policy. For at the bottom of Ferdinand's
heart lay hatred against the Habsburg dynasty of his son-in-
law Philip the Handsome, bto whose hands the premature
death of his own heir, Don Juan, had delivered the Spanish
heritage, and who had encouraged the rebellion of Castile
against Aragon.

Margaret knew the real inclination of her former father-
in-law, and she determined, after her triumph over Chievres,

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to bind him more closely to the Habsburgs by making an end
of the Castilian influences at the Court of Malines which
were trying to get young Charles, who would some day be
Bang of Castile, into their power. Since Ferdinand's regency
over the lands of Queen Isabella, Don Juan Manuel de la
Cerda, leader of the Castilian nationalists, had been living
as a political refugee at the court of Maximilian, which he
left in 1 5 1 2 in order to prepare the future of an independent
Castile in the immediate proximity of the young Archduke.
Don Juan Manuel was received with distinction by the Bur-
gundian court circles. He had been a favorite of Philip the
Handsome, who had even taken him into the Order of the
Golden Fleece; and his position at the court of Malines was
such that Ferdinand of Aragon was obliged to consider him
a threat and a danger.

Margaret was aware that her father-in-law had for some
time been trying to get Don Juan Manuel into his hands. A
ship fitted out by Ferdinand lay for months in a Netherlands
harbor ready to bring him alive or dead to Spain. Nor did
Margaret herself look favorably on the disruptive Castilian
influence at her court. Her close collaboration with Henry
VIII, who in such instances never hesitated, and her victory
over the Burgundian nationalists, made her decide on a step
that was to unchain forces the consequences of which she
realized too late. She had Don Juan Manuel taken prisoner
with intent to deliver him over to Ferdinand of Aragon.

The impression this action of hers made upon die court
of Malines was indescribable. She, a woman, had dared to
have a knight of the Golden Fleece lifted from his bed like
a common criminal, ignoring the statutes of the Order which
gave its members the privilege of being judged only by their

The Chess Flayer

equals. She, a woman, who could never aspire to the honor
of knighthood, who, though a ruler of imperial blood, could
never approach the glory of the Golden Fleece, had dared
to violate these statutes, which were held no less sacred than
the highest laws of the land.

Since the death of Philip the Handsome the Order had
been without a leader, as the Duke of Burgundy, its head,
was, in the person of Archduke Charles, still a minor. The
indignant knights did not hesitate to draw Monseigneur
into the defense of rights that should be sacred to him. So
that one day shortly after ManuePs imprisonment the Re-
gent saw herself faced with a most painful situation: her
nephew at the head of a deputation of knights, among whom
Chievres was not lacking, came to complain of the unworthy
treatment of his confrere. The knights demanded that they,
and they alone, should be informed of the accusation against
Don Juan Manuel, and that meanwhile his imprisonment
should be mitigated as much as possible.

For this sudden, threatening reaction of the Order the
Regent had not been prepared. She was not yet aware that
she had injured feelings which to her, a woman, had only
theoretical significance, nor that she had overreached her-
self in interf ering with something sacred that she, the uniniti-
ate, had looked upon as a fine but somewhat worn bit of scen-
ery. The visit of the angry deputation made her see that she
had been playing with a fire which might well singe her own
wings, and though she severely pointed out to Monseigneur
that the Order had not been called together with her con-
sent, in her first consternation she promised her visitors not
to deliver Don Manuel over to Ferdinand.

Nonetheless Margaret's legal advisers went ahead with
the trial that had for its purpose the destruction of Don

The Roman Crown

Manuel's power, and a second time Monseigneur came with
a few knights to declare that the Regent was treading the
country's laws underfoot by doing violence to the statutes
of the Order.

In the audience chamber of the Court of Savoy a dramatic
tension reigned. Erect and haughty, her eyes flaming in her
pale face, the Regent took Monseigneur to task for having
listened to bad advice in coming to invoke the laws of the
land against the bearer of the highest authority. She lashed
at the nobles with words of scorn, in which echoed her own
helpless anger that she, the Emperor's daughter, was forever
excluded from the sacred circle. The gentlemen wished to
lay the statutes of their Order in her way, to use a laughable,
infantile ruling as a means of hampering her political work?
"Ah, Messeigneurs! " the Regent cried, "if I were such a man
as I am a woman, I would make you bring your statutes to
me and make you sing out passages from them!"

Both parties appealed to the Emperor. Maximilian, who
could not let the Order down and did not want to disavow
his daughter, commanded that Don Juan Manuel be sent to
Germany, where his case would be investigated. Therewith
the painful incident was apparently ended. But it had done
more harm to the authority of the Regent than she could
guess. It had for the first time brought young Charles into
open conflict with his aunt, who had evidently no concep-
tion of his glorious Golden Fleece, and had brought him
into closer contact than ever with his beloved tutor, the
defender of the Order. The foreign triumvirate might share
Charles's bedroom it did not share his heart, nor his con-
fidence. Through Margaret's faux pas Chievres had won the
battle for the immediate future.

Robbed of every support from the Burgundian nobility,

The Chess flayer

the Regent presently found herself facing political calami-
ties that were to deprive her of the last vestiges of her author-
ity. It was now that the League of Malines shared the fate
of the League of Cambrai and fell apart as a result of the
mutual suspicion of its members. After Ferdinand of Aragon,
as Margaret had feared, had become reconciled with Louis
XII, Maximilian too let himself be persuaded by Ferdinand
to an armistice with France. The Emperor was well aware
that by this act he was undermining the policy of his daugh-
ter, the more so since he had also concluded the armistice in
the name of his English ally, who had not the remotest
knowledge of it. He took good care, "le bon pere Maxi", not
to keep his daughter posted about his actions.

But Margaret's informers did good work. Reports reached
her about Spanish visitors received by the Emperor, and it
was Ferdinand of Aragon himself who imparted to his
daughter-in-law the fact that her father had thwarted her
political efforts. Margaret wrote to Maximilian that this was
big news and very different from her understanding
"Monseigneur, ce sont nouvelles, qui sont bien grandes et
diff erentes de mon entendement". How would the English
king, who was still carrying on his preparations for the cam-
paign of the following summer, receive this betrayal? And
did Maximilian not understand that France wanted to con-
clude peace only to break the mighty alliance of the four
great powers? Aragon and even England did not need to fear
France. Between the Catholic King and France there were
great mountains, and between France and England the sea:
but between the Low Countries and France there was no
separation; and her father knew the great and inveterate en-
mity the French bore to his House "Monseigneur, entre le

The Roman Crown

roy catholique et France il y a de grandes montaignes, et
entre France et Angleterre est la mer: mais entre ces pays et
France n'y a point de separation; et vous scaves la grande et
inveteree inimitie que les Fra^ois portent a ceste maison".

But the Emperor had already gone too far. And when
Margaret urged ^ith the greatest emphasis that at least he
should hasten the marriage between Charles and the English
Princess Mary, so that Henry VIII should not feel himself
utterly betrayed by the Habsburgs, Maximilian kept post-
poning this decision as well until it was too late and Mar-
garet's last chance to rescue the friendship with England was
lost. In August, 1514, Henry was reconciled with France
and gave his sister, the eighteen-year-old fiancee of Arch-
duke Charles, in marriage to the French King Louis XII him-
self, who had lost his wife, Anne of Brittany, a short time
before.

The break between England and the Habsburgs was a
crushing blow for the Regent of the Netherlands. The treat-
ment her father had meted out to her, who in her letters
would refer to herself as the one who day and night thought
only to do him service "celle qui nuit et jour ne panse que
de vous faire service" had injured her deeply. Her author-
ity in the Netherlands was hopelessly undermined. She
feared more than ever that the opposition would let things
come to open revolt, and she foresaw that Chievres would
very soon be approaching the Emperor to have the now
fourteen-year-old Charles declared of age. She knew that
her opponents spoke evil of her to her father and more
and more felt herself slipping from the Emperor's confi-
dence. Was it not said that the Emperor no longer kept her
informed of his wishes in important affairs "son vouloir et

The Chess flayer

intencion sur les grans affaires" because Margaret could
not keep a secret and told everything all over Europe? The
opposite was true, declared the Regent in a tragic memoran-
dum to the Emperor. She had never received so much of His
Majesty's affection and confidence that he was willing to
keep her informed of things that were not akeady known to
everybody else, so that foreigners knew the important events
before she did. The Emperor must remember that it was he
who must maintain her authority, because with the loss of
hers he would also lose his.

But all these warnings came too late. The party of the
opposition had taken care that the Regent should not get
back her lost prestige. Under the influence of Chievres the
States General demanded in 1514 the emancipation of Mon-
seigneur Charles. If the Emperor agreed to this, said the
States, they would make him, who was always short of
cash, a present of 100,000 gold guilders. That was the price
they were willing to pay to be relieved of the imperial gov-
ernment, freed from the imperial lieutenant.

Without informing the Regent, Chievres negotiated with
the Emperor in the matter. And Maximilian did not spare his
daughter this bitterest disappointment: she received his
order to proceed with Charles's emancipation without hav-
ing been consulted in this decision that completely altered
her own position. And while the star of Margaret of Austria
sank in the political sky of Europe, Monseigneur Charles,
serious and somewhat backward for his almost fifteen years,
but with a formidable future ahead of him, occupied the
impressive seat at the table of the Privy Council from which
his aunt had steered the fate of Europe. In place of her fine
widow's cap of lawn this blond youth's jewel-studded

The Roman Crown

bonnet now bent over the documents of state. And when the
Emperor, according to his habit, sought the advice of his
daughter, she answered from the seclusion of her writing
cabinet that she was no longer mixing in any aif airs and it
would be necessary for him to write to Chievres "mainte-
nant je ne me mesle d'affaire quelconque, et sera necessaire,
que escripves audit Sieur de Chievres. . . ."

Quiet descended on the Court of Savoy. Madame's apart-
ments were stripped of their tapestries, the bed of its damask
canopy. For etiquette commanded that the former Regent
should accompany her nephew, the young Archduke and
"Prince d'Espaigne" as he called himself during the life of
his grandfather Ferdinand, upon his triumphal journey
through his provinces. Everything that could contribute to
Madame's comfort, carpets and wall hangings, plate and bed
furnishings, was taken along in the baggage train of Monsei-
gneur's party. Malines, Antwerp, Ghent, and Bruges were
the first places the young ruler visited. Bergen-op-Zoom,
Delft, the Hague, Haarlem, Leiden, and Amsterdam were
the cities in the north privileged to accommodate Charles
and Margaret and their impressive suite for a day or more.
In the middle of July the royal cavalcade left the Northern
Netherlands, and on the 2 6th Monseigneur and Madame de
Savoie returned, after a six months' journey, to a festive
Brussels.

Many bitter experiences had fallen to Margaret's share
during those months. Now that she no longer represented
the highest authority, criticism of her conduct of affairs
came to her more frankly than had been possible before.
Her secretaries did not withhold from her that Monsei-

The Chess Player

gneur's entourage emphasized with satisfaction the discon-
tent with her government. She was reproached for having
encouraged the war with Gelderland, for not having been
able to maintain the peace of Cambrai. Some even went so
far as to accuse her of having run the government solely for
her own benefit, of having plundered the treasuries of the
poor provinces for her useless campaigns and of having,
moreover, ruthlessly enriched herself. From all sides com-
plaints of this sort penetrated to Monseigneur and his Coun-
cil, poisoned the atmosphere, injured feelings, upset confi-
dence. Evil rumors surrounded the Dowager Duchess of
Savoy like an invisible wall, and in the midst of the festive
show of Charles's entries she often felt herself bitterly de-
serted, exposed to an intangible threat. She asked herself,
and wrote the Emperor, whether she would not do better
to retire graciously to Burgundy and devote herself to her
own "small interests".

After the return to Brussels she frankly told Chievres,
now the head of Charles's government, how depressed she
was by these sneaking and untrue charges which were con-
stantly being made behind her back and which had robbed
her of Monseigneur's confidence without her being able to
defend herself against their invisible attacks. The Governor,
in calm awareness of his complete victory over the woman
he had for years looked upon as his opponent, advised her to
defend herself by openly bringing up in Monseigneur's
Council what others had until now been whispering.
Chievres knew Margaret's talents and, rather than make her
a dangerous enemy, he tried to win her to his plans, which,
moreover, did not differ very much from the methods of her
own government. Her sense of reality had again and again

The Roman Crown

convinced the level-headed Margaret of the necessities by
which Chievres was now also bound: only a policy of neu-
trality and friendship with the great powers who were Bur-
gundy's neighbors could in the long run reconcile the un-
willing Netherlands provinces to the central authority,
which was in the last analysis dependent on their good wHl.

Accordingly Madame de Savoie read aloud at the meeting
of Charles's Council on August 20, 1515, a memorandum in
which she candidly spoke of the accusations by which it had
been hoped to undermine Monseigneur's affection for his
aunt. She gave a survey of the political events that had made
her conduct of affairs necessary, of the war she had had to
wage against Charles of Gelre, always strengthened anew
by the French in his revolt against Monseigneur's authority,
and she showed how she, instead of having enriched herself
through her office of Regent, had on the contrary run into
debt for the sake of the Archduke.

Both young Charles and his tutor made speeches after
the reading of this exhaustive document. They considered
Madame altogether cleared of the charges, spoke many kind
and appreciative words, made promises for the future. It
appeared that the atmosphere at the court had been clarified.
And at last, after her strenuous years of rule, after her fa-
tiguing journeys with Monseigneur, Margaret found the
quiet to go once more about her own affairs, to devote her-
self to her art collection, her library, to that distant structure
which already on a previous occasion had made her forget
the lack of any political work: her church at Brou.

Many years had passed since on that stormy August day
in 1506 the first stone of the church that was to be a mauso-

200 The Chess Player

leum for Philibert the Handsome had been laid. When Presi-
dent Gattinara had visited Brou in 1509 to give the Regent
a report on the state of its development, he had been enthu-
siastic about the grandiose appearance of the only partially
completed cloister. "Madame", he wrote with that southern
fire with which he customarily expressed himself about any-
thing in which he was interested, "if you had seen what has
come into being, you would rather sell the most expensive
tabard you possess than fail to collect the thousand ecus
necessary to complete it".

In that same year of 1509, when Margaret had acquired
the Franche-Comte of Burgundy and was less dependent
upon her income from her Savoyard widow's pension, she
had decided on important enlargements and embellishments
to the still very sketchy plans. And not for material reasons
alone. In the will she had had drawn up in 1 509 she expressed
the wish to be buried in the land where she had spent such
happy years, and in this church of Brou, beside Philibert the
Handsome.

It was the French painter-engineer Jean Perreal, Mar-
garet's drawing master in the happy days of Amboise, who
now received the commission to make of this modest church
a mausoleum worthy to enclose three royal tombs.

Perreal was an all-round man and not likely to let slip an
opportunity in any field. He knew how frightened patrons
can become on learning what their plans will cost, even
though they may be of imperial blood and rule over wealthy
provinces. He found it more sensible to conceal the real facts
and send Madame attractive designs to study, without men-
tioning the amounts these plans would consume.

To execute the three tombstones, the jewels to be enclosed

The Roman Crown 201

in the costly shrine, Perreal had employed the cooperation
of one of the greatest French sculptors, Michel Colombe,
who, although already eighty years of age, "very ancient
and heavy, gouty and sickly" "fort ancien et pesant,
goutteux et maladif ", was inspired with a youthful fire to
accept the royal commission. From the sketches of Perreal,
Colombe was to prepare models which would be sent from
Tours to Malines, so that Madame could have the tomb of
Duke Philibert complete before her eyes.

But the conceited and selfish Perreal fell to quarreling
with the monks of Brou. The bickerings reached the ears
of Madame, the monks complained to their protectress, and
Perreal, who had thought himself in clover for the rest of
his life, was dismissed. As his successor a mason, as he mod-
estly called himself, was appointed, one Louis van Boghem,
a practical and matter-of-fact Fleming, who set to work
industriously after having regulated his reward in detail.
Seven years after Margaret had renewed the "pledge of
Brou", the work that Perreal had kept dangling with so
much artistic finesse at last began to take shape. New "pat-
terns" were drawn, and the death of old Michel Colombe
made necessary a new design for Philibert's tomb as well.
A studio of Flemish artists was set to work, and thus there
came into being in southerly Bresse a monument related in
style to the "Maison du Roi" in Brussels and the town hall
of Ghent. Jan van Roome of Brussels, famous for his tapes-
tries, designed the tombs, the choir stalls, the wonderful
windows. Conrad Meit, a German by birth, but living in
Flanders, received the commission for the memorial statues.
Sketches and models were sent to Margaret, and during the
years 1515 and 1516, when "grans affaires" more or less

202 The Chess Player

passed her by, she selected those final designs that were to
make this monument of Brou into an incomparably beautiful
example of Flemish gothic.

Margaret was never to see her own church. Sooner than
she could have guessed in 15 15, the task of government was
once again to command her attention. She, who in her youth
had traveled over the whole of Europe, was scarcely to leave
the Netherlands again in the second half of her life. Until
a sad procession went the same way that the bride of Phili-
bert the Handsome had once gone, a procession bearing the
embalmed body of the Regent of the Netherlands to its rest
in the grave she had prepared for herself.

While Madame de Savoie was enjoying life and looking
younger and more attractive than ever, as the Venetian
ambassador Pasqualigo noted, events took place in Europe
that were once again to raise her to highest political power.
Once again it appeared how well the constant turnabout
implied in her device Fortune, Infortune, Fortune char-
acterized her life's course. And as so often before, once again
it was Death that took a hand in her career.

Louis XII had not long survived the triumph he had
achieved over young Archduke Charles of Austria by
marrying his lively bride, Mary Tudor. With an exuberant
company of young English courtiers, under the leadership
of that same amorous Charles Brandon, now Duke of Suf-
folk, who had once paid court to Madame de Savoie, Mary
had arrived in her new kingdom. On the voyage she had
fallen under the spell of the engaging Suffolk and had already
deceived her ancient bridegroom Louis before she had even
laid eyes on his decrepit form.

The Roman Crown

Her buoyant personality was a revelation to poor Louis,
whose late wife, Anne of Brittany, had had little charm.
Mary had everything her own way, and the King, accus-
tomed to living carefully and going to bed with the chickens,
as his courtiers mockingly said, let himself be dragged about
in the mad festivities the enamored Queen gave in honor of
her English companions. It was too much for Louis, and a
few months later the new Queen of France stood by the
deathbed of her husband. With indignation Margaret heard
the startling news that Charles Brandon had taken the widow
back to England and on the way had persuaded her to marry
him, something it was difficult for her to get into her head,
as she wrote her father, since there was no sense in it nor any
sign of good "Ce que bonnement ne peult entrer en ma
teste, car il n'y auroit nulle raison ny apparence de bien".
. . . Wherewith she expressed her opinion on marriage for
love in general and on the jovial Suffolk in particular.

Louis' death brought to the French throne a reckless
young daredevil, Francis I, the son of Margaret's sister-in-
law, Louise of Savoy, Duchess of Angouleme. Five years
older than the Archduke of Austria and Prince of Spain,
Francis, lively and intelligent, lighthearted and casual, un-
faithful and unpredictable, felt infinitely superior to that
young Charles who talked through his nose, could not close
his mouth, and was ruled by his aunt. He, Francis, was idol-
ized by his mother, and he was Charles's feudal lord for
Flanders and Artois. He was immensely wealthy seemed to
be so, at least, to judge by the feasts he gave and the state
kept by his mistresses and his followers. He was strong, agile
as quicksilver, an ideal tournament hero, the darling and
the downfall of women. For Francis there was no doubt

204 The Chess Player

that he, and no one else, was the chosen leader of Europe,
the hero who would save Christendom from the Turks,
against whom the powerless old Maximilian of Habsburg
had for so long been figuring out hollow plans.

Upon his accession to the throne Francis had expressed
himself in a condescendingly friendly and somewhat con-
temptuous manner to the Burgundian ambassadors who had
visited him. Charles need have no illusions, he said, that he,
Francis, would let himself be led by him, the way Maximilian
and Ferdinand of Aragon had led his predecessor, Louis XII.
If anyone was to rule the roost in Europe, Francis would do
so and no one else. And to let them see that he would not be
trifled with, he made preparations to reconquer the dukedom
of Milan, which Louis had had to abandon.

Being a vassal of the young French King, Archduke
Charles was invited to attend the coronation festivities of his
new rival But with circumspect politeness Chievres excused
his young master, who daily had to deal with most important
and pressing affairs. The point was to keep the easily of-
fended Francis in a good mood so long as Charles's power
still rested exclusively on Burgundy. This delicate commis-
sion was well entrusted to Chievres, whom the world knew
as French-minded. Reason the more to keep Madame de
Savoie, who was denounced at the court of Francis for being
"pure English", well in the background.

But one year after Francis I was crowned, Death once
again brought alterations in the balance of power in Europe.
Ferdinand of Aragon died in January, 1516, and the domin-
ions over which he had ruled Aragon and Castile, Granada
and Leon, Naples and Sicily, and the "Indian" realms of the
New World came to increase the prestige of the sixteen-

The Roman Crown 20$

year-old Archduke of Austria, whom Francis so haughtily
treated as a vassal. Burgundy still needed to keep on good
terms with France, for the Spanish inheritance had not yet
been confirmed by the Cortes, and rumors reached through
to the Netherlands of a wish to proclaim Archduke Ferdi-
nand, Charles's young brother who had grown up under
pure Spanish influences, as King of United Spain. Hence
there was haste for Charles's coronation journey, and the
same necessities held for him that had also compelled his fa-
ther, Philip the Handsome, to peace with France. Chievres'
policy, which in the beginning could afford to be strictly
Burgundian, must now be altered to a European policy. As
leader of Charles's government he would soon have to under-
take the voyage to Spain with his young master.

Peace with France but also peace with England. This
was an objective which Madame de Savoie could under-
stand. With tense nerves Margaret caught every mood at
Charles's court, which she never left for a moment. The
English ambassadors, their finger on Europe's pulse, re-
ported to Windsor that they were not so certain any more
whether Madame de Savoie was still the same devoted ser-
vant of English interests that she had formerly always been
considered. They thought they would do well, they wrote
Henry VIII, not to let Madame so much into their secrets
any longer.

For evenings on end Margaret played backgammon with
Chievres, and the rattle of their dice spelled trouble for the
English ambassadors. Even though the Burgundian govern-
ment did not yet have entire confidence in her, it was never-
theless clear to everyone that the star of Madame de Savoie
was rising again. At the same time the Emperor was doing

206 The Chess Player

his best, from his side, to strengthen the position of his
daughter, for the warnings he would not listen to when the
Netherlands had jingled the tempting gold they wished to
pay for the emancipation of Charles, had proved correct.
With Margaret's authority in the Netherlands Maximilian's
also had declined, and to his amazement he had been obliged
to observe that the government of his grandson was going
its own way and no longer troubled itself about the imperial
wishes. He had to admit that under Margaret's regime it had
been different. And in the warmest terms he wrote to Charles,
"King of Castile and Aragon, Granada and Leon", about
the former Regent, urging him above all to take his good
aunt his "sy virtueuse et bonne taente" into his confi-
dence, to assign her a yearly stipend, and never to forget
that Charles, his grandfather, and his aunt "were one and the
same thing corresponding to one and the same desire and
affection" u une mesme chose correspondant a ung mesme
desir et affection".

Nor did the Emperor leave it at letters. In February, 1517,
he came himself to the Netherlands in order to effect a com-
plete reconciliation between his daughter and his grandson.
Maximilian's warm, enthusiastic personality did not fail to
make an impression on the still not very independent Charles,
who up to now had let himself be ruled entirely by the calm
and temperate Chievres. Grandfather Maximilian spoke of
the future, and his dreams imparted themselves to Charles's
half-awakened consciousness in visions of heroism and world
domination. Spain, Austria, and the Netherlands, declared
the Emperor, together formed a territory greater than that
of any other ruler in Europe. But Charles would be irresist-
ible if to the royal crowns he already possessed there should

The Roman Crown

be added that ancient and honorable jewel, symbol of divine
power on earth, the imperial crown of the Holy Roman
Empire of the German Nation.

It did not lie with the Emperor, it is true, to have his
grandson appointed to succeed him. That important decision
rested with the German Electors, who usually had their own
motives in making their choice. But the Electors, Maximilian
knew by experience, were amenable to a certain clinking
reason, susceptible to the persuasive power of that most elo-
quent of advocates: gold. The Emperor, alas, possessed no
gold but Charles's future empire should provide sufficient
security for the German bankers, who had already so fre-
quently rescued Maximilian himself from pecuniary distress.

The Emperor had indeed once had other plans, had made
other deals with the crown, which he would presumably
not wear much longer, and the cash value of which he was
well able to estimate. In the camp before Tournai he had
roused in his jovial "son of England" illusions concerning
the emperorship, which the treasury of the wealthy and
fair-haired Henry would certainly be able to afford. Even
to the strongest competitor of Charles and Henry, to Francis
I of France, Maximilian had made an offer to influence the
Electors in his favor, and with the object of having several
strings to his bargaining bow, he had approached Louis of
Hungary, the young husband of his granddaughter Mary,
with the same plan. But in the end the old Habsburg had
after all preferred to keep the imperial crown for his own
family, and Charles, hesitant at first to take on, in addition
to his cares in the Netherlands and Spain, the responsibilities
of that unsurveyable empire, finally succumbed to the luster

208 The Chess Player

of Maximilian's pictures of the future and, a few days before
his departure for Spain, declared himself prepared to accept
the candidature.

If the Spanish problems were at that moment scarcely to
be assessed, those of the Netherlands were assuredly burden-
some enough. Charles of Gelre, whose activities became al-
ways more threatening as the mood of France became less
benevolent toward Burgundy, had received support in the
north, where revolt against the all-encircling House of
Habsburg had manifested itself among the Friesians, always
jealous of their independence. In Utrecht and Overijssel,
Drenthe and Groningen, the movement had also raised its
head, and soon Holland was laid under tribute by armed
bands, while on the Zuider Zee the dreaded pirate, "Big
Pete", left no merchant ship alone and caused the entire crew
of a defeated Dutch squadron to walk the plank without
quarter. The "Black Bands" of Gelderland pressed to the
very gates of Amsterdam, and the peaceful little cities of the
Northern Netherlands Medemblik, Alkmaar, Beverwijk,
Asperen were reduced to smoking ruins, until at last help
from the southern provinces brought relief and it was pos-
sible to conclude an armistice. On his departure for Spain
Charles left Count Hendrik of Nassau behind as captain
general of the Burgundian troops, for the protection of the
battered northern areas.

Besides the military authority, Charles also settled the
government of the interior before leaving. And on the
regency council, of which Maximilian was honorary chair-
man, and on which sat the Princes of the blood and the
Knights of the Golden Fleece, a modest seat was assigned
to the woman who had once exercised the whole power of

Colkction of H. M. the Queen of the Netherh

Charles V, by Joost van Cleve.

Bayerisches National-Museum, Munich

Margaret of Austria, by Conrad Meit.

The Roman Crown 20$

Burgundian government. Madame de Savoie, after two years
without work, was once more included in the government,
even though her influence was confined to the vote she could
cast in the meetings of the council.

But as soon as Margaret had again acquired a firm foothold
in Charles's administration, her talents and her changeable
stars were quickly to bring her back again to the place she
had occupied before. Early in 1518 the chairman of the
council and the chancellor Sauvage, who had opposed Mad-
ame de Savoie's influence with special vigor, both died In
July of that year Charles granted his aunt the right to sign
all state papers and to control the finances. An annuity of
twenty thousand pounds was granted her. Only the official
title of Regent was lacking but this too she would speedily
manage to earn.

In the midst of the problems that he, the ruler of the
Netherlands, had to solve in Spain, Charles decided to take
measures toward the realization of his grandfather's idea,
and to have himself elected King of the Romans, successor
to the Emperor. A special ambassador, de Courteville, left
Spain for Maximilian's court, and in his baggage he bore
instructions to support the efforts of the Emperor with
money and promises, and a sum of 100,000 gold guilders in
letters of exchange which was indeed to prove no more
than a drop on the sizzling platter of greed.

For the seven Electors the Archbishops of Mainz, Trier,
and Cologne, the King of Bohemia, the Duke: of Saxony,
the Count Palatine of Bavaria, and the Margrave of Branden-
burgwere aware that besides Charles, in t 6 capacity of
King of Aragon and Castile, Francis I also wished to sue for

220 The Chess Player

the highest dignity of Christendom, and they resolved to sell
the Stone Throne of Charlemagne to the highest bidder. It
was nothing new for the Electors to sell their vote in the
imperial election. New, however, were the prices the two
competitors appeared willing to pay, and new were the
methods of financing that Charles applied. It was with the
money and the credit of the Augsburg banking house of
Fugger that the cost of the Roman Crown was to be met.

They had begun some time ago to make themselves in-
dispensable to the aging Emperor, these Fuggers. For his
campaigns and his as yet unrealized coronation journeys,
even for his household and his daily necessaries of life, they
had loaned Maximilian now enormous, now modest sums,
receiving as security first the revenue from the silver and
copper mines of the Tyrol, then a number of counties and
estates that were never redeemed. The reputation of these
Augsburg bankers increased with Maximilian's debts. Their
name and their gold resounded over the whole of Europe,
their offices formed the principal sight of many great centers
of commerce,

It was bills of exchange on the Fuggers that Charles's
ambassador had brought along to Germany. But this money
was to be paid over to the Electors only after the imperial
election, and, as Maximilian reported to Charles, those gen-
tlemen had already accepted considerable sums from the
French L ; ng and were to be satisfied only with cash.

How difficult it was to collect this cash in sufficient quan-
tities would soon be apparent. The effort of Francis I to raise
large loans from the bankers in Genoa and Lyons had failed,
and only Fraiicis's doting mother, Louise of Savoy, was pre-
pared to lay tier fortune in the balance for the pleasure of

The Roman Crown 211

seeing her darling crowned Head of Christendom. For
Charles too, far away in Aragon, the problem of how to
come by sufficient money had many angles. Payment to
the Electors had to go through Maximilian's hands, and in
that process, the initiate of all Europe knew, some part of it
always adhered to his fingers. No wonder Chievres recalled
the businesslike calm with which Madame de Savoie used to
play backgammon, and that, since she had the Fuggers and
other large banking houses right at hand in the wealthy city
of Antwerp, he should call upon her help.

Thus in that summer of 1518 Margaret once again found
herself in the thick of the European battle, waged this time
not with weapons but with ducats and gold ecus, against that
ancient enemy of Burgundy, the French royal house. Still
other valuables were at her disposal. Where gold did not
suffice human lives must be sacrificed, and to the Elector of
Brandenburg, who must at all costs be won over to the Habs-
burg candidature, the hand of Charles's youngest sister, the
unhappy Catherine at Tordesillas, was to be offered for his
son.

In August, 1518, the Emperor called a meeting of the Diet
in Augsburg, where he could exercise his influence upon the
Electors in personal discussions. His success was overwhelm-
ing, and de Courteville excitedly wrote Margaret from
Augsburg that everything was going well. Five of the seven
Electors had promised their votes to Charles, and the two
others could be dispensed with. The costs of this victory
were enormous. The Elector of Brandenburg sold his vote
for a life annuity of eight thousand guilders and a hundred
thousand guilders in cash, to be paid on the day of the elec-
tion. The Infanta Catherine, whom his son was to marry,

212 The Chess Player

would bring in a considerable dowry. .The three Arch-
bishops, of Mainz, Trier, and Cologne, had been no less mun-
dane in their demands. Mainz was to receive a yearly stipend
of ten thousand guilders and thirty thousand gold guilders
in cash, as soon as the other Electors should have given their
votes to Charles; Cologne got the promise of an annuity of
six thousand guilders and twenty thousand in cash; and the
Count Palatine demanded not less than one hundred thou-
sand guilders and a yearly stipend of twenty thousand for
his brother. And then there were presents and pensions to
friends and members of the family, even to secretaries and
servants of these covetous gentlemen. The total of Maxi-
milian's commitments at Augsburg came to 5 14,000 guilders
in gold, comparable to some fifteen million dollars today.

Charles, shocked at such reckless expenditure, made use
of a picturesque metaphor in his correspondence with Mar-
garet. The horse upon which his aunt would like to see him
ride was a very expensive one, the young Emperor-m-spe
felt. Margaret had to admit as much, but she thought it a
horse which its purchaser could easily acquire at that price,
and now that it was trained to Charles's hand she was of
opinion that he must not let it escape, whatever it might cost
him. . . .

But the bargain was not yet struck. The Pope, who in the
long run would have to crown Charles Emperor of the Holy
Roman Empire, was well aware what power he would be
granting to the House of Habsburg which, in Italy, at only
forty miles' distance from the Papal States, possessed the
Kingdom of Naples. Sufficient motives could be found for
declaring the election of Charles as King of the Romans an
impossibility. There was the fact that Maximilian had never

The Roman Crown 215

been crowned Emperor in Rome and therefore himself had
a right only to the title of King of the Romans. Thus it was
excluded that during his lifetime this dignity should be con-
ferred upon another. Francis I seized upon these papal
motives with enthusiasm in order to undermine the candida-
ture of his rival.

In the midst of these uncertainties the death bells tolled
yet again over Europe. Maximilian, who, convinced of vic-
tory, was already prepared to call the Diet together in Frank-
fort to proceed with the elections, had suddenly passed
away. And while mourning her father, whose charming per-
sonality she had loved despite the humiliation he had brought
upon her, Margaret saw the future of her House endangered
once again. For both Henry VIII of England and Louis of
Hungary remembered Maximilian's promises and entered
the struggle for the imperial crown.

Francis I doubled his prices, multiplied his intrigues ten-
fold. His ambassadors made no secret of the fact that their
king would get himself elected by love, by money, or by
force "soit par amour, soit par argent, soit par force". They
traveled through Germany with a train of mules laden with
gold. Because the Banking House of Fugger would accept
no French bills of exchange, it was said in Germany that
the French were transporting their gold in secret, in sacks
tied to Rhine ships. Margaret, to whom all these reports
came, whose days were entirely filled with them, and who
handed them on to whoever could use them to advantage,
saw but one way: no empty promises, but to give with full
hands, "so that the preacher should have good credit" "qui
faisoit avoir le precheur bon credit". Chievres had judged
correctly: Madame de Savoie did not let herself be hampered

214 The Chess Player

by unbusinesslike scruples on this unsavory terrain. She held
the threads of intrigue firmly in her hand, saw through men
and their greedy motives and was able to intervene in events
at the right moment and with great determination.

And not only in the matter of money. Rumors reached
Margaret that Francis I intended to have himself crowned in
Rome, however the decision -of the Electors turned out; in
fact, that he was even going to Frankfort in order to dictate
the decision. French troop concentrations were observed,
and the Burgundian government, under Margaret's resolute
leadership, recruited infantry, reinforced the cities close to
the French borders, and proceeded to the mobilization of
everyone in the southerly provinces who could carry arms.

While Francis I was intriguing in Hungary, Poland, and
Bohemia, in Rome and even in Spain in the very entourage
of his opponent, Margaret sent her confidential secretary,
Marnix, to the Reich with new promises, new warnings. If
the Electors, Margaret declared, should really place the King
of France on the Imperial throne they would be signing the
death warrant of their own authority. They only needed to
remember the action of the French crown against the inde-
pendent dukes, against the French nobility. If they did not
wish to choose the King of Spain, it would be preferable
that they should crown one of their own candidates, a Ger-
man ruler, as emperor. But this piece of advice must be a
last resort for Marnix. The instructions Madame gave him
contained first a large number of other suggestions which
he must not leave untested. And Marmx went to work: he
tried to win over the venial Lutheran condottiere, Franz
von Sickingen, and the Swiss; influenced the cardinals in
Rome, flattered the Electors who had already promised their

The Roman Crown 215

votes; conferred with Jacob Fugger, in whose coffers the
bills of exchange were kept which Italian, Netherlands, and
German banking houses had handed over to the King of
Spain. Count Hendrik of Nassau, who had a very good name
in the Reich, was also called in to exert his influence on the
Reichstag itself. And to lend additional strength to all this
activity, the merchants of Antwerp were forbidden to loan
money to any foreign power, so that all their wealth should
remain at Charles's disposal.

The principal result of these intrigues proved to be that
the Electors raised the price of their votes. Brandenburg de-
manded double the amount promised him, a double dowry
for the Infanta Catherine, and complete assurance that the
money would actually reach him. He did not want to run
the risk, he said with commendable frankness to Margaret's
envoy, of falling between two stools.

Charles had to hand out more than a million gold guilders
to resecure the votes Maximilian had already bought for him.
The three archbishops alone, with their brothers and neph-
ews, their councilors and valets, laid hold of not less than half
a million gold guilders, again something over fifteen million
dollars in today's currency.

Gold, gold, gold. The struggle for the imperial crown
continued, holding all Europe in breathless suspense. The
Pope suddenly declared in favor of the "Catholic King",
Charles of Habsburg. Charles distrusted this benevolent
sentiment, had papal letters intercepted, and discovered that
the Holy Father was intriguing to have one of the German
rulers elected Emperor. Toward the end of February, 1519,
the confusion was so shocking, the position of the Electors
so enigmatic, that Margaret, considering Charles's chances

2i 6 The Chess Player

completely lost, thought the honor of the House of Habs-
burg could be rescued only through launching Charles's
brother, the Infante Ferdinand, as a new candidate for the
emperorship.

But against this plan Charles protested vigorously. Ferdi-
nand's candidature was withdrawn. And the struggle con-
tinued, for and against Charles, for and against Francis, with
money and promises, warnings and threats. Only one thing
was certain in all this chaos: the German people did not want
the Frenchman and were prepared for armed revolt should
the Electors designate him. The day of the election ap-
proached, and the news flew through Europe that the French
king had gone to Lorraine. Did he intend to carry out his
plan of having himself elected, sword in hand? The German
cities armed. Charles, having agreed to protect the Electors
from violence, had Frankfort surrounded by 25,000 mer-
cenary troops.

This last measure it was that settled the matter. On the
1 7th of June of that eventful year of 1519 the Diet met in
Frankfort. The presence of Charles's troops gave the Mar-
grave of Brandenburg and the Count Palatine of Bavaria,
who both still stood on the side of the French King, such a
fright that on the very day of the election they returned to
the safe side. On the 2 8th of June, at seven o'clock in the
morning, the seven Electors betook themselves in solemn
procession to the Church of Saint Bartholomew, and four
hours later Charles of Austria, Lord of the Netherlands,
King of Spain, of Naples and Sicily, was elected King of the
Romans by unanimous vote.

Two days later the news reached the Netherlands. And
the head of the government, Madame de Savoie, who saw

The Roman Crown

her months of incessant labor crowned with success, made
the joyful news known to the people in an impressive fash-
ion. Forgotten were the quantities of gold, the machina-
tions, betrayal over and over again bought back, the baseness
which, as one of Margaret's ambassadors had expressed it,
made the bribers themselves blush for shame. In immaculate
flight Margaret's proclamation soared above this earthly
mire. Bonfires were to be lighted, thanksgiving feasts pre-
pared, and prayers and honor must be brought to God, "be-
cause the Lords Electors of the Holy Roman Empire, unani-
mously, inspired by the Holy Ghost, without any vacillation
whatever, had elected her Lord and nephew King of the
Romans".

Le temps m'est long et j'ay bien le pourquoy,
Car ung jour m'est plus long qu'une sepmainne,
Dont je prie Dieu que mon corps tost ramainne
Ou est mon cueur qui n'est plus avec moy.

Q est vers vous, repousant sans requoy,
Et pour cela que j'en suis en grant painne,
Le temps m'est long.

Je vous jure, et sans mentis ma foy,
Que pensement non plaisant me promainne
Ou que soye, dont forment je m'atainne
Et rescripre je vous puis orendroy:
Le temps m'est long.

Time is long to me and I have reason,
For a single day seems longer than a week,
Hence I pray God soon to return my body
To where my heart is that is no more with me.

It is near you, -without tranquillity
In its repose, and since I am in great pain
Time is long to me*

I swear to you, nor perjure my good faith,
Wherever I may be unpleasing thoughts
Drive me about, whence I am much harassed,
And can repeat it to you even now:
Time is long to me.

CHAPTER EIGHT

Ladies Peace

MESSENGERS hurried through Europe. And al-
though in all his lands the treasuries stood empty
while notes with his signature were piling up in the offices of
the Fuggers, the Welsers, the Gualterottis, those who spread
the joyful report throughout Charles's empire were re-
warded with generous hand. The good city of Malines even
gave a gratuity to the postmaster's boy who had accom-
panied the first messenger with the news.

The young Emperor was well aware of what his aunt with
her tireless staff of secretaries had managed to achieve for the
good cause. The differences that had existed in the past be-
tween his chancellor Chievres and Madame de Savoie had
melted away in the excitement of the election campaign. The
narrow Burgundian interests Chievres had formerly de-
fended now merged for him into the problems of Charles's
empire. To serve his Emperor it was no longer necessary for
him to work against Madame de Savoie. And even before
Charles learned of the decision in the struggle for the impe-
rial crown, on the first of July, 1 5 19, in Barcelona, he signed
the letters in which, in view of the inestimable and praise-

219

220 The Chess Flayer

worthy services "grands, inestimables et louables services"
she had rendered and was still rendering, and of the
complete and extraordinary confidence he had always placed
in his "tres-chere dame et tante, dame Marguerite", he
named her Regent and Governess of the Low Countries and
charged all his subjects to obey her as they would himself.

Charles did set restrictions upon this apparently unlimited
power, by secret instructions in which the bounds of Mar-
garet's competency were narrowly prescribed. But before
the eyes of the world Madame de Savoie was completely
rehabilitated, and how highly Charles valued her help in his
election became clear when, a year later, he presented her
with the city and the land of Malines for the duration of her
life.

A mature woman now in her thirty-ninth year, Margaret
faced for the second time the task she had first undertaken
twelve years before under entirely different circumstances.
Then she had ruled in the name of a minor child, under the
supervision of her father, whose wayward fancies she often
could not follow and who in the end destroyed her loyal
work by his capricious interference. Now she was the dep-
uty of an emperor-king who had accepted her authority in
his youth and upon whose confidence she now thought she
could reckon. Margaret looked back upon her first period
in office as a training school that, sometimes through bitter
experience, had given her wisdom. The problems of her
second regency were indeed already gathering like men-
acing cloud-masses on the horizon, but she felt better able
than ever to handle the rudder.

They were ominous enough, in fact, the difficulties with
which the young Emperor would have to contend. The
rivalry between the royal houses of Habsburg and France

Ladies' Peace 221

had been sharpened by the struggle for the imperial crown
to a personal competition between the two young monarchs,
Charles and Francis, who seemed destined by nature to mis-
trust and hate each other. Over against Francis in his glis-
tening satin, beringed and beplumed, boundlessly vain, friv-
olous and faithless, swift and sly in his reactions, in body and
mind as flexible and agile as a rapier, stood Charles, pious and
modest, slow of tongue and tardy of comprehension, just
as tenacious as his opponent was variable. No reconciliation
seemed possible between these two characters, between the
claims of each to world domination. Whom should Christen-
dom choose for its leader against the ever-present danger
of the Turks: the brilliant and polished Frenchman, who
recklessly disposed of his subjects' possessions and the rev-
enue from his well-rounded, homogeneous territory, or the
sluggish Habsburger, whose disconnected lands lay spread
over the old world and the new, and whose tides stood for
some archaic pretense rather than for real power?

In less than a year Charles and his grasping ministers had
made mortal enemies of the Spaniards. "Our Indians", the
Burgundians called their ruler's new subjects. Chievres and
his friends took what they could get: offices and dignities,
titles and prebends. Charles was a foreigner in Spain. He
disdained Spanish fashions and ordered his tabards, his dou-
blets, hose, and boots, in Flanders. He knew no Spanish. He
and his were despised. The Spanish nobility went over to
the French king and the population was prepared to take up
arms in order to drive the hated foreigner and his robber
knights of the Golden Fleece out of the country.

In the Netherlands sentiment was divided. People glowed
with pride that the "natural ruler" of the Low Countries had
achieved the imperial dignity. But there was no disguising

222 The Chess Flayer

the fact that Charles would not consider his Burgundian
provinces as the center of his Empire, and they feared a re-
turn to the policy of Maximilian, who had treated his grand-
son's lands as conquered territory.

And in the German Empire, an undefined conglomeration
of ecclesiastical and temporal principalities totally lacking
in any unity of purpose, in these first days of Charles's em-
perorship people were listening full of hope and emotion to
a mighty and a stirring sound, the rough but genuine ring of
Martin Luther's voice. His message penetrated to German
ears, in which the chinking of all those gold ducats still
echoed that had poured into insatiable hands in payment for
the imperial crown. Still another sound had dismayed the
pious German people in those days: the rumbling of the
money chests with which a representative of the Archbishop
of Mainz and an agent of the Fugger Bank had traveled
through the country gathering in the solid Rhenish guilders
which the citizens were obliged to pay for the remission of
their sins. The Archbishop of Mainz was to use half the
proceeds to pay off to the Holy Father in Rome the purchase
price of his archiepiscopal dignity, which the Fuggers had
advanced to him. The other half was destined for the build-
ing of St. Peter's. And if sins already committed did not pro-
duce enough, Fugger's agent with businesslike accuracy
collected sums with which one could buy absolution for
misdeeds one would be committing in a distant future. . . .
The voice of Brother Martin rose and in the Holy Roman
Empire the fuse was lit that was to set Europe in flames.

Insurrection, rebellion, and lack of funds, spiritual fer-
ment and an irrepressible drive for renewal these were the
internal problems of that unstable Empire. And at its bor-

Ladies' Peace 223

ders lowered the Turkish menace, barely held off by a heroic
Hungary.

ew

Margaret sent a fleet from Zeeland to transport her neph
from embittered Spain to the Reich, where princes and
people were clamoring for their new ruler, not yet suspect-
ing that they had placed a foreigner upon the imperial
throne. Charles made ready to take over these dominions,
only to disappoint his German subjects as he had the Span-
iards. On the first of July, 1520, the fleet landed in Flushing,
and five days later the Regent of the Netherlands greeted
her nephew the Emperor in Ghent, amid the rejoicing of
the people.

Charles was able to report to his aunt, who still counted as
"bonne angloise", on the meeting he had just held with his
"uncle", the Most Serene King of England. He had made
good use of his brief stay in Dover. Toward Henry, who
thought himself the indicated mediator between Charles
and Francis I, the young Emperor had borne himself with
flattering modesty, and the all-powerful Cardinal Wolsey
had radiated charm for the sake of a yearly stipend of seven
thousand ducats, hinting in cautiously disguised words at the
papal tiara, his boldest dream. Would Francis be able to
influence fourteen cardinals? Seventeen were already pre-
pared to carry out Charles's wishes. The Pope was known to
be incurably ill. Perspectives of unlimited power, of fabulous
wealth, opened before Wolsey's greedy eyes. He was the
humble servant of His Imperial Majesty.

Margaret was full of admiration for the diplomatic talents
of her pupil. That her former ally Henry VIII was again
won to the Habsburg cause signified the triumph of her

224 The Chess Player

policy. And though Henry had immediately come over to
France after his meeting with Charles, to outdo his "brother
Francis" with the showy excess of his riches, only to be him-
self outdone by the incomparable luxury of Francis's "Field
of the Cloth of Gold", Margaret did not fear this competi-
tion too much. She hoped that Charles in his modest dark
velvet had piqued Henry's vanity less than Francis, who
might perhaps be thought to have a more beautiful beard,
handsomer calves, more success with women. Margaret
looked forward to going with Charles to greet the English
king as soon as the meeting with Francis should have taken
place, so that she could receive Henry's first impressions, and
if necessary color them according to her own wish.

One month after she had welcomed the Emperor, Mar-
garet traveled with him to Calais. Henry VIII, who had
emphatically declared himself to be "neutral" between the
rivals, Charles and Francis, on this occasion sided altogether
with the Emperor, who knew how to flatter him by that
slow helplessness of his and did not irritate him by any chal-
lenge of bejeweled show. Wolsey, the vision of the triple
crown before his eyes, seemed as wax in the hands of Mad-
ame de Savoie.

On his return to the Netherlands Charles was awaited by
ambassadors from the Electors, who requested him to make
speed with his crowning. Once again Margaret's palace at
Malines was bared of its hangings, its silver plate. For
Charles's possessions could not equal the art treasures of his
aunt, and she loaned him for his coronation banquet her in-
comparable dinner services and her world-famous tapestries.
With her ladies and damoiselles in waiting and in the com-
pany of the Dowager Queen of Aragon, Germaine de Foix,
Margaret journeyed to Aix-la-Chapelle to attend the solemn

Ladies' Peace 22$

ceremonies. Her bodyguard of halberdiers received new
jerkins and new bonnets for the occasion. The suite accom-
panying the Emperor-King displayed a luxury that was little
short of fabulous. The States General had once again made
available some hundred thousands of pounds Flemish for the
festivities.

Seated upon a magnificent white charger and clothed in
his own colors of gold, silver, and crimson, the young Em-
peror rode to his coronation surrounded by a mounted body-
guard. The horsemen wore red, yellow, and white, and on
their backs Charles's device, "Plus Oultre", was to be read
embroidered in letters of gold. Five of the seven Electors
had ridden forth to meet their chosen ruler, and the cere-
monies of welcome outside the city gates were so protracted
that the glorious cavalcade entered the venerable coronation
city only at the fall of dusk, Charles's white steed but a pale
spot among the countless darker forms of the surrounding
horses.

Everyone went early to rest. For at the crack of dawn,
at six o'clock of the crisp autumn morning, while all the
bells of Aix boomed out their bronze-throated tones over the
city, the temporal Electors came to conduct the King of the
Romans to the Church of Our Lady, where the three Arch-
bishops awaited him and blessed him "like a bride". In the
sacred vaulted precincts, upon a platform hung with gold
and silver fabric, sat the royal ladies of Charles's suite, the
Dowager Duchess of Savoy and the Dowager Queen of
Aragon, surrounded by their noblewomen. In the dusky
light of the thousands of candles and torches they were "all
cloth of gold, tissue of silver, and great chains and necklaces
of gold and precious stones" "tout drap d'or, toille d'argent

226 The Chess Player

et grosses cheines et quarquans d'or et pierre precieuses".
Awe-inspiring in their sanctity were the consecration, the
anointing, the crowning, the girding with the sword of
Charlemagne. Margaret, a striking figure in her festive bro-
cade gown and severe widow's cap, heard and felt the solemn
music that accompanied the ceremony, and she became
aware that this stirring moment signified the fulfillment of
her life's work. As Charles lay stretched in the form of the
cross before the high altar, as the holy rites were performed
over him, she knew that that work had not been in vain. The
motto of her grandfather, Emperor Frederick III "All the
world is subject to Austria" seemed to have become a real-
ity.

While the Emperor sat at the gala banquet, where the food
w;as served on Margaret's silver services, while in the narrow
streets of Aix the people gave themselves over to delirious
festivity, and on the squares whole oxen were being roasted
and silver coins and oats scattered among the excited masses,
there flickered over the Low Countries the lightning of an
approaching thunderstorm. And when on the day following
the coronation the trumpets echoed through the city and a
papal declaration was read out to the effect that his Royal
Majesty should from now on bear the title of Emperor-Elect
of the Romans, the moment had come for Margaret to leave
Aix. Reports reached her that French troops were threaten-
ing the southern borders of the Netherlands and that in the
north the Gelderland revolt had broken out anew. The Re-
gent hastened to return to her provinces. By the second of
November she was already back in Brussels, all her attention
immediately absorbed by the ominous aspect of the situation.
A few months later, in March, 1521, a border incident

Ladies' Peace 227

sufficed to precipitate once more the struggle between
France and Burgundy.

The Regent, who was at the same time superintendent of
the Burgundian army, had taken her measures. At a sitting
of the States General held in Ghent in July, 1521, she deliv-
ered with dramatic eloquence her accusation of faithlessness
and treachery against Francis I, in a compelling challenge to
the States to support their young master with money and
troops. This time the States allowed themselves to be con-
vinced. The presence of the Emperor, who, Margaret de-
clared, stood ready to throw into the balance his life, his
possessions, and all that God had given him, in order to res-
cue and protect his subjects, made them forget their guiding
principle, that the best way to keep the peace was to refuse
money for war. Enormous subsidies were promised and
they were more than welcome. For in the month of August
Cardinal Wolsey crossed the Channel from England as
"mediator" between the "Most Christian King" Francis and
His Imperial Majesty Charles.

A mediator, both parties felt, is only useful when benevo-
lently inclined. While the French representatives regaled
Henry's powerful minister with the noblest French wines
they could lay their hands on, Margaret forestalled the wishes
of this splendor-loving and not very sporting cardinal, who
detested riding on horseback, by sending him a luxurious
red velvet litter, entirely upholstered in green satin so that
his purple should stand out the more tellingly. Two large
mules with red leather harness bore this comfortable con-
veyance, and in it the Cardinal, after his conference with the
French ambassadors, went on to Bruges in order to supple-
ment his mediator's work with a treaty between his master
and the Emperor.

228 The Chess Player

No expense was spared in receiving the prelate with
princely luster. The members of his suite were overloaded
with presents in money, from the Bishop of Durham down
to the trumpeters and choirboys who went everywhere with
His Eminence. To these resonant manifestations of friend-
ship Madame de Savoie added those flattering attentions of
which only a woman thinks. The English gentlemen were
quartered with prominent burghers of Bruges, and every
morning officers of the imperial household delivered at their
dwellings a basket of fresh rolls, two silver pitchers of wine,
a pound of sugar, some white and yellow candles, and a torch
to light their bedrooms.

The courtesies were reciprocal. The Cardinal's musicians
sang and played at the meals Margaret offered her distin-
guished guests, and the result of all this was a treaty, which
the charming hostess could not have improved on had she
wished. Once again it was agreed that the Emperor should
wed an English princess, named, like the first one, Mary
Tudor; but now it was not Henry's sister, but his only little
daughter, heir to his crown, who was to make young Charles
happy. An offensive alliance against France, still complacent
over the good results of Wolsey's "efforts at mediation",
was appended to the marriage contract.

Of the Regent of the Netherlands, however, one sacrifice
was asked. She must expressly declare that this time the Low
Countries would not remain neutral in the prospective war
against France. The Pope was invited to take part in the
league, and the Swiss and the Venetians were also to have
their share of the booty when Francis I should have been
driven out of Italy altogether and for good. Just as she had
once made plans at Cambrai with the French Cardinal of
Amboise for the destruction of Venice, so Margaret now

Ladies' Peace 229

discussed with the English prelate how France could be
eliminated as a great power. Madame de Savoie had experi-
ence with princes of the Church, and this tkop also her success
was complete.

The Emperor certainly had need of England's friendship.
The situation in his Spanish kingdoms was becoming more
menacing than ever and his presence there was highly neces-
sary. In the German Empire Martin Luther was steadily
acquiring more followers, the breach was steadily widening
between Rome and the people, between traditional author-
ity, represented by Charles, and his subjects, who knew that
the Emperor understood no German and whose national
feelings were aroused since they now for the first time heard
sermons preached in the language of their own country. In
all parts of the Empire a young national consciousness was
growing that looked upon this Habsburger as a foreign op-
pressor.

Before he left the Low Countries in an attempt to pre-
serve Spain from civil war, Charles settled one matter for
which no solution had yet been found: the claims of his Aunt
Margaret and his brother Ferdinand to the inheritance of
Emperor Maximilian.

For the sum of 250,000 pounds Flemish, to be paid in ten
yearly installments, Margaret waived her rights to her fa-
ther's heritage. Archduke Ferdinand, who after Charles's
coronation had remained behind in the German Empire with
the title of Regent and Head of the College of Electors,
obtained the hereditary Austrian lands, which Charles re-
signed in his favor. And so the House of Habsburg was split
into two branches: the Spanish, of which Charles V re-
mained the head, and the Austrian, which was soon to de-
velop into a notable power through the passing of Hungary

230 The Chess Player

and Bohemia to Ferdinand's wife by the death of her brother
Louis.

At Charles's departure for Spain the Netherlands found
themselves in not very happy circumstances. A severe plague
epidemic had ravaged the population. The people of Fries-
land and Gelderland repeatedly threatened the northern
provinces, and Christian of Denmark, who had not yet re-
ceived all the dowry Ysabeau was to have brought with her,
gave Charles, his brother-in-law, two choices: to pay, or to
make war. Once again the States were called upon for sub-
sidies, and once again, this time out of fear of the Danish war-
ships and of the measures Christian could take against Neth-
erlands merchant shipping, the demands of the government
were met. In July, 1521, the Danish king came in person to
Antwerp, ostensibly to receive the remainder of Ysabeau's
dowry, in reality to persuade Charles to a war against the
Hanseatic cities, primarily against Liibeck.

Charles was not disinclined to oblige his brother-in-law.
It was Margaret who realized what a war in the Baltic would
mean for her provinces: the end of commerce with the Han-
seatic cities, the impossibility of importing grain; high costs
and starvation in the Netherlands. Once again the Regent
showed that she knew herself to be no mere instrument of
the Emperor's authority, but the guardian of interests that
could not be brought into line with the Habsburg plans.
Strongly supported by her Council, she was able to persuade
Charles of the futility of an alliance with Christian.

After the Emperor had gone, Margaret prepared for a
journey through the provinces, attending various meetings
of the States in the hope of moving them to replenish her
alarmingly empty coffers. But most of her visits were fruit-

Ladies' Peace 232

less. And again she would have resorted to the pawning of
her jewels. But the Antwerp bankers scorned this sort of
collateral. By now they had acquired some idea of the enor-
mous loans the Emperor had had to take up for his election
campaign. They realized that their foreign colleagues too,
who had financed this undertaking jointly with them, had
not yet seen any repayment on the loaned sums. The Fug-
gers, the Welsers, and the Gualterottis wailed that they
would go bankrupt. And Jacob Fugger, who assessed a
doubtful debtor at what he was worth even though he wore
the holy imperial crown, demanded payment in a letter to
Charles in which he did not hesitate to call a spade a spade.
"It is well known and clear as daylight," he wrote to his
overlord, "that your Imperial Majesty could not have got the
Romish Crown without my help".

Was it any wonder that in these circumstances the Em-
peror's creditors would have been overjoyed to lay hands
on even half of their millions? Or that the Antwerp bankers
declined to loan money on a few rings and other ornaments
belonging to Madame de Savoie?

In the midst of her priceless art treasures, the luxury of
her Court of Savoy, the Regent lived in desperate anxiety
about the morrow. She was faced with an insoluble dilemma.
If the troops which the struggle with France made necessary
were not paid, they would plunder their remuneration to-
gether out of the very area they were supposed to defend
against the French raids. If the States thought they could
not impose any further taxes, they would quickly see their
citizens plunged into poverty and misery in another way.
An ineluctable fate seemed to hang over the Netherlands.
Peace was not anywhere in sight.

Thus the years of Margaret's second regency dragged on.

The Chess Player

Threatened by the French in the south, by Gelderland and
Friesland in the north and east, looted by pirates, ravaged by
plague, floods, and hunger, the unhappy inhabitants of the
Low Countries saw their last pennies claimed by a govern-
ment that wanted to make war in Italy. In every city resist-
ance grew. Even in the loyal Burgundian stronghold of
Malines the people began to stir.

Lack of funds, insurrection, war lack of funds, insurrec-
tion, war. They were always the same problems that trou-
bled Margaret's days. The demands of the imperial world
policy on which the fame and glory of her House depended,
and the interests of her stricken provinces these were
sometimes totally contrary objectives which the Regent
must attempt to reconcile. But whenever this proved impos-
sible, whenever not a single way suggested itself of obliging
the Emperor without dealing her subjects a deathblow, then
the Regent with unshakable determination chose the side
of her provinces, always managing in the end to see that her
views prevailed.

When in 1523 Christian of Denmark, fleeing before his
rebellious people, came to ask his brother-in-law's help in
getting back his crown, it was the persistent watchfulness
of the Regent that saved the Netherlands from the destruc-
tive consequences of a war with Scandinavia. Even the sup-
plications of her foster child Ysabeau, who dared to plead
with her aunt on behalf of her infamous husband, could not
soften her heart. She paid Christian and Ysabeau a yearly
stipend, tried to bring order into the confusion of their
household, gave presents to the children; but, as two years
before, she refused to let her lands, already so severely af-
flicted, be involved in a quarrel which could only result in
endless disasters.

Ladies' Peace

The English troops that were expected to help carry the
war into French territory did actually land at Calais in Au-
gust, 1523. In their first bellicose enthusiasm they even
pressed to the very gates of Paris. But when the autumn rains
made the terrain impassable, and the region had been practi-
cally plundered empty, the English Generals bethought
them of the warm hearth-fires at home. In November they
embarked again. Military honor had been satisfied.

Again the Burgundian troops were demanding their pay.
Although the revolt in Friesland had been put down and Em-
peror Charles, in his capacity of Count of Holland, was
recognized as lord over Friesland, Gelderland went on with
its struggle. Money was also needed again for defending the
cities of North Holland. The States proposed to the Regent
that it would be better to burden the ducal domains with
mortgages, or even to sell them, rather than appeal again to
a desperate population.

But against this measure, by which the power of the House
of Habsburg in the Netherlands would become a mockery,
Margaret's feudal notions rebelled. Power over a people, she
opined, ought to rest upon possession of the ground on which
that people lived. And there remained nothing for her but to
write her nephew the Emperor that no more financial sup-
port was to be expected from the Netherlands. Her last at-
tempts had been met by the population with such flaming
indignation that all the provinces threatened to revolt. The
measure of their misery was full.

At this point an event occurred abroad which changed
all the relationships involved. Francis I had set forth to re-
conquer Milan, that illusion of the French, so often lost and
lost again. Milan was indeed taken, and Francis continued
further into the country in search of enemy troops that had

The Chess Player

entrenched themselves inside the walls of Pavia. He laid siege
to this city and lingered for several months in a dolce far
niente on one of those idyllic country estates of North Italy
where life can be sweeter than anywhere else in the world.
Francis seemed scarcely to remember that he was busy be-
sieging a city.

A sudden attack by the imperial troops scattered the
French. Their king, who had defended himself bravely, was
wounded in two places and attempted to save himself by
flight. But he was recognized, and it was Charles de Lannoy,
the Viceroy of Naples, who received the sword from the
hands of the royal prisoner.

The impression this news made throughout Europe was
overwhelming. Now that he had caught the French king
for him, Charles V wrote to his triumphant general, he him-
self had hardly anything else to do than begin the war against
the heathen. In the Netherlands Margaret saw to it that bon-
fires were lighted and processions held to thank God that the
French king, France itself, was in the Emperor's power.
Francis I was taken off to prison in Spain.

This was the opportunity, thought the Regent, for an at-
tack upon the enemy along his northerly frontiers, to put
an end for good and all to French presumptuousness. The
Netherlander, indeed, looked with admiration on the bon-
fires, treated the thanksgiving parades with suitable respect;
but they obstinately refused the money for which the Re-
gent again asked. Once more Margaret hoped for the help
of the English. But for some- time now the friendship which
Henry VIII and his minister Wolsey had announced with
so much enthusiasm had been cooling. Charles had repeat-
edly borrowed large sums from his "uncle of England" and
now saw little advantage any more in a marriage with Mary

Ladies' Peace 235

Tudor, from whose dowry his debts would undoubtedly be
deducted. In spite of his solemn engagement to the English
princess, he had for some time been paying court through his
representatives to Isabella, the daughter of the wealthy King
Emanuel of Portugal, to whom Charles's elder sister Alienor
had been married off, after he had already been married to
two of her aunts, daughters of Ferdinand and Isabella of
Spain. Isabella's dowry would certainly be paid in cash. Her
"Indian" possessions were more attractive to Charles than
the English friendship, which it would always be easy to
buy back again with Isabella's ducats.

Nor was the atmosphere in England the same as before.
Instead of Cardinal Wolsey, Adrian of Utrecht, Charles's
former teacher, had been elected Pope, and when Adrian
died in 1523 after bitter disappointments, Wolsey saw the
triple crown elude him once again. Was this the way the
Emperor kept his promises? The Cardinal remembered the
excellent wines the French Queen Mother, Louise of Savoy,
had had sent to him at Calais. He found his master quite pre-
pared to make other arrangements for the future of his only
daughter. Negotiations were opened for her marriage to the
King of Scotland.

Thus Margaret's last support fell away. An empty ex-
chequer, pillaging and mutinous troops, impoverished and
rebellious subjects, who were trying to help themselves and
who behind the government's back had sent representatives
to France and England to rescue at least their commerce and
fisheries such were the circumstances Margaret found her-
self facing at the beginning of 1525.

In enemy France the King's mother, Louise of Savoy, who
ruled as regent, lived amidst cares just as desperate as those
of her sister-in-law Margaret. The son she worshiped con-

The Chess flayer

fined in a tower and facing the choice between lifelong im-
prisonment and handing over half his kingdom to the hated
Habsburg; her country threatened by the imperial troops,
her treasury empty, the population of North France tor-
mented and pillaged by English and Burgundian raids there
seemed no possible way out for the French Queen Mother
either, unless the Emperor could be persuaded to make
peace. She determined to turn to her sister-in-law, Madame
de Savoie.

This rapprochement was for Margaret too the only way
out. She proceeded to Breda, where a conference had taken
place between French representatives and some of her coun-
cilors under the leadership of Count van Hoogstraten. An
armistice was concluded, the herring fisheries were to be
protected, and the sea declared free for transport of mer-
chandise. In anticipation of a settlement concerning the
liberation of the French King, Netherlands commerce was
at least temporarily saved and the Burgundian troops could
be used to suppress the revolutionary movements that were
cropping up all over the Low Countries.

With all the inflexibility of her unbending character the
Regent fought against this resistance to her authority. She,
who in her diplomatic dealings had always given proof of
so much tact and adaptability, showed herself in her struggle
with the Netherlands cities a true descendant of Charles the
Bold. In Limburg, in Brabant, at Bois-le-Duc primarily,
which was even besieged by Margaret's troops, the recalci-
trance of the population was very severely dealt with. A
bitter enmity grew up between the Regent and the people
which in its gatherings drew strength from the new teach-
ings of Brother Martin, who, albeit against his will, had
brought about the all-destroying peasant revolution in the

Ladies' Peace

German Empire. But however threatening this popular
movement became, Margaret was not to be distracted by
any opposition from her life's aim: to keep the Netherlands
as a coherent and consolidated entity in faithful subjection
for her nephew the Emperor, the leader of Christendom, the
head of her House.

The armistice with France served to establish the condi-
tions on which Charles would be prepared to release his rival
from the prison in Madrid, where Francis, the much adored,
surrounded and admired, sickened with hopeless loneliness.
The people of the southern Netherlands knew well what
they would propose to do with the prisoner whose armed
bands had trampled and looted their countryside:

Que ferons nous du roy, What shall we do with the King,

De nostre prisonnier? This prisoner of ours?

Que feist-on a due Charles What did they do to Duke Charles

Quand f ut prins a Nanchy? When he was taken at Nancy?

On ne sceut qu'il devint, They never knew what became of him,

On le scet bien en France; They know it well in France;

Qui lui f eroit ainsy If the same were done to him

Ce seroit la vengeance. It would be vengeance.

Thus sang the Burgundians, who had forgotten what they
had thought at the time of their "Due Charles", the Scourge.
But the Emperor, who in his slow deliberation never let him-
self be carried away by first impulses, informed himself of
Henry VIII's disposition and of his Aunt Margaret's opinion.
The Regent saw the question entirely from the Nether-
lands standpoint. Cession of the French territory up to the
Somme, of Therouanne and Boulogne, were her first de-
mands. The French feudal sovereignty over Flanders and
Artois was to be ended and Francis must give up for good
his alliance with Charles of Gelre. About the restitution of

23 S The Chess Player

the dukedom of Burgundy, which was one of the points on
Charles's program, Margaret did not speak. It would be of no
use to the Netherlands, and once more the Regent showed
that the interest of her provinces weighed heavier with her
than any increase of territory, which would mean princi-
pally a rehabilitation.

The tension in Europe mounted, and the prisoner of
Madrid, who until now had been looked upon as a menace
against whom one must defend oneself by leagues and trea-
ties, acquired through his helplessness, through the presump-
tion of his opponent, a tragic halo of injured chivalry, of
noble martyrdom. What Francis would never have been
able to bring about in freedom he succeeded in doing in his
Spanish prison: Europe began to look favorably upon him,
and a call to the Emperor to exercise clemency toward his
powerless enemy echoed from all sides.

In the Imperial Council opinion was divided between two
possibilities: rendering France harmless for good, or binding
the king so closely to Habsburg that he would never again
attempt resistance against his original rival. But practically
everyone agreed that no one could carry this affair through
to a successful issue as well as the Regent of the Netherlands,
"cette mere de sa Majeste", a better judge of what was to the
Emperor's advantage and more sincerely devoted to it than
anyone else in the world. Voices were raised: Madame de
Savoie, and she alone, should be given the task of negotiating
with the Regent of France, the Queen Mother Louise.

But before this happened there came an end to the uncer-
tainty and suspense in which Europe had been living for a
year. Francis I was suddenly found ready to grant all the
demands of his imperial opponent. He promised to give back
Burgundy to Charles, grandson of Duchess Mary, six weeks

Ladies' Peace 23$

after his return to France. He resigned his feudal sovereignty
over Flanders and Artois, his claims to Naples, Arras, and
Hesdin. He left all allies whom he had incited against the
Habsburgs, alternately or simultaneously, to their fate. He
would pay back the Emperor's debts to Henry VIII and
promised him ships, troops, and money, to get himself
crowned in Rome. A double marriage was to seal this agree-
ment. Francis himself was to marry Alienor, the Dowager
Queen of Portugal, and her little daughter, the Infanta
Maria, was to marry his son the Dauphin. The King should
immediately be set free, and his two sons should substitute
for him in Spain as hostages. If he did not hold to the letter
of the agreement and what a cruel one it was! Francis
was to return to Spain and be locked up again in the tower
in which he had been imprisoned for a year.

This "treaty of Madrid" was received in the Netherlands
as a blessing and a relief. A solemn torchlight procession, in
which the Regent herself took part, wound through the
streets of Malines to thank God for the peace. For nights on
end bonfires flickered over the Low Countries, the populace
was regaled on vats of Rhenish wine, and in the drunken
atmosphere of festivity of those days it suddenly seemed
that a royal signature to a shameful document had put an end
to all misery.

But no one in the Netherlands lived long in this blissful
folly. Debts were just as oppressive, the default in payment
of the troops just as dangerous for the countryside, where
plundering bands of soldiers continued to take what was due
them. The bonfires had scarcely gone out, the Te Deum had
scarcely died away, when it became evident that the Peace
of Madrid had done nothing to alter the state of affairs.

For Francis had only concluded this peace with the inten-

240 The Chess Player

tion of breaking it as soon as his feet were on French soil
again. While still in captivity he had secretly declared that
his consent had been given only under pressure of necessity
to this treaty which, in the words of a later verdict, as a
Frenchman he should never have made and as a knight and
man of honor should never have broken. The notables of
the country, nobles and ecclesiastics, declared that the King
had had no right to alienate the French inheritance. The
States of the Duchy of Burgundy made known that they
would defend their land with arms if the imperial troops
made any attempt to execute the treaty by force.

Margaret's agents announced to her that the French king
was already exploiting in Europe the popularity he had won
in prison, and that the league between Francis, the Pope, the
Venetians, and other Italian rulers was threatening the Em-
peror in Italy. A new war seemed unavoidable and the impe-
rial authority in the Netherlands appeared to be threatened
with extinction. In Flanders and Brabant the desperate
people had already revolted, in Namur it was necessary to
punish the cry of "Vive le Roi de France!" by public whip-
ping. ^

While the battle against the Habsburgs was flaring up in
Italy, where Milan was occupied by the imperial troops and
the allies were defeated at Genoa and at Naples, Henry VIII
dealt the conquering Emperor a heavy blow by breaking
the still formally extant treaty and joining with his enemies.
An invasion by united French and English troops threatened
the unprotected Netherlands, when it became known that
the imperial troops had taken Rome and had made of the
Eternal City a terrible scene of pillage and murder. The
Emperor, Protector of the Church, the Catholic King,
whose Inquisition in Spain was exterminating the heretics,

Ladies' Peace 24.1

whose anger raged against Luther's followers, who defended
the old faith by means of the stake, had abandoned the heart
of the world, Rome itself, to a barbaric army that intended
to proclaim the new teachings of this Brother Marth by
destroying the treasures of Rome and desecrating its
churches. All Italy, all Europe now knew but one enemy:
The Emperor, whose world power threatened to stifle
everybody else.

Charles's triumphs in Italy were of short duration. As al-
ways, money was lacking now too for the German and Swiss
mercenaries. The French moved into Lombardy and recap-
tured Genoa, and tortured Italy now welcomed as liberators
the armies it had once feared.

While the Emperor received with cool politeness the
envoy of his former ally Henry, who came to announce the
declaration of war to him, he treated the herald of the French
King with the lashing disdain that he felt for the cowardly
betrayal of his master. "I would hold you for craven and
wicked if you failed the faith I have in you" "J e vous tiend-
rois pour lasche et meschant si vous me f ailliez de la f oy que
j'ai de vous", Charles had said to Francis in an interview with
his prisoner in Madrid. And "craven and wicked" the King
now was in his eyes, the King who had broken his promises
and had not returned to prison, not even to save his honor.
It seemed impossible that so much hatred, so much contempt,
so much reciprocal offense, could ever be wiped out.

Yet Europe could not go on living under this enmity. The
English people, who blamed the wounded ambition of the
hated Wolsey for the war, rose in revolt, and Henry VIII,
whose popularity had suffered greatly through his passion
for Anne Boleyn, for whom he wished to repudiate his
queen, Catharine of Aragon, determined to drop the Cardi-

242 The Chess flayer

nal in order to keep Anne. Ambassadors left England to
suggest to "la bonne Angloise", Madame de Savoie, an
armistice between Henry, Francis, and Charles.

Even before she had received the consent of her nephew,
Margaret caught at this straw. And when an imperial repre-
sentative had arrived in England an armistice was quickly
arranged. The treaty left the Regent a free hand once more
to reinforce Charles's authority in the Netherlands. The
resistance of Gelderland against Burgundy was broken. Mar-
garet had once more succeeded in preserving the unity of her
provinces. In October, 1528, a treaty was concluded with
Charles of Gelre, whereby he recognized the feudal sover-
eignty of the Emperor over Utrecht, Overijssel, and Gelder-
land. It seemed that at last the disastrous war years that had
destroyed the prosperity of the Netherlands provinces
would be followed by a period of peace.

The years of unceasing work that had again and again
brought her fresh, practically insoluble problems, had worn
Margaret out in both body and mind. Her characteristic
generous and sunny disposition had given place to a severe
inaccessibility toward those from whom she expected criti-
cism or opposition. After the death of Philibert the Hand-
some her personal life had become a lonely one. No tender-
ness mellowed the contours of her character any more; no
longer did her commanding temperament find the counter-
balance of a self-effacing love. Her affection for her brother
Philip's children may for a while have done something to fill
the gap, but her heart lay buried in Brou and no longer
helped to temper the ready combativeness that had always
been one of her most marked characteristics.

Countless disappointments in men and their promises had

Ladies' Peace 245

made her hard, and she had been embittered by the suspicion
with which her subjects and even those who called them-
selves her servants regarded her. Incapable of grasping the
significance of the forces in revolt against her absolute re-
gime, she saw in the protests of her impoverished and tor-
mented people only criminal rebellion. She did not under-
stand the despair that was growing in a religiously and
economically disrupted world. And to the extent that she
resorted to more and more severe measures, she lost the au-
thority she had once acquired through her conciliatory at-
titude, her tact, her warm humanity. Her mental resistance
gave way under the pressure of never-ending worries. A
deep despondency frequently came over her, a longing to be
freed at last from the struggle, the discord, thVrebellion, the
mistrust.

But she knew that she could not be spared yet, and she
resisted her own longing for rest, for some peaceful haven,
with the same hardness with which she compelled the popu-
lation to resign itself in obedience to the absolute monarch,
which she held to be the God-given order. She would fulfill
to the utmost her duty, which lay in preserving the Em-
peror's Burgundian lands intact in their subjection. A hard
life had caused her to unlearn leniency both toward herself
and toward others.

But with her mental resilience Margaret also had lost the
robust health that in the past had so often rescued her from
depressions. Some trouble with her leg hampered her move-
ments seriously, and while she had heretofore been able to
moderate opposing views by her presence, she was now
obliged to leave much of her task of government to her coun-
cilors, who all too readily took advantage of the increasing
helplessness of their ruler. Although she still f ulfilled her role

244 The Chess Player

in European politics with undiminished authority, in domes-
tic affairs she felt the reins of control, which in the beginning
she had held with so much self-confidence, slip from her
hands.

Was it any wonder that, though not yet fifty, Margaret
felt old and weary of life and that she sometimes considered
laying down her task and retiring to surroundings where she
would find rest and affectionate care? For a long time she
had supported the convent of Our Lady of Seven Sorrows
at Bruges, and as the years went on, always heavier with sick-
ness and worries, Margaret more often surrendered herself
to the consoling thought of seeking refuge with the Rever-
end Mother Ancelle, whom she called "my good mother,
my friend" "ma bonne mere, ma mie". But her time had
not yet come. Once more all her talents were to be called
upon in the service of her Emperor and her House, in order
to restore to an exhausted and moribund Europe a few mo-
ments of peace.

In January, 1529, the Pope and the Emperor had con-
cluded an "eternal" alliance, in which the Pope had promised
his new ally that he would come and crown him the follow-
ing year in Boulogne. And now that the Italian points of
dispute were settled, the possibility of coming to an agree-
ment with France also seemed greater than before. At the
ratification of the armistice with the Emperor, Francis I had
been noticeably charming to Margaret's ambassadors, and he
had given them the assurance that he would most gladly
come to an understanding with their mistress. The Queen
Mother, Louise of Savoy, Madame d'Angouleme, asked the
Burgundian ambassador with emphasis whether her sister-
in-law, the Regent of the Netherlands, had not given him a
letter for her. She had already used all her powers of persua-

Ladies' Peace

and to ease the hatred which might cause the downfall of
all Christendom. She wished to beg Margaret also to use her
influence upon the Emperor, so that the two of them, as wise
and peace-loving women, might put an end to this heart-
rending war.

And Madame d'Angouleme did more. In deepest secrecy
and without the King's knowledge she sent a special envoy
to Malines with a peace proposal to be tested against the ideas
of Madame de Savoie. And after these two princesses, with
utmost circumspection and entirely upon their own respon-
sibility, had thus entered into contact, they sounded the two
"enemies themselves concerning the possibilities of a rap-
prochement. The Emperor, who saw the Turkish attack
upon the Christian world drawing nearer, and whose empire
was being torn by the struggles of the Reformation, was
already prepared to drop his claims to the dukedom of Bur-
gundy. Francis I, who had perceived that he could expect
little satisfaction from his Italian dreams in the immediate
future, was quite ready to promise to forget them entirely.
The two monarchs, who a few years before had assailed each
other with insults and challenges, seemed to have realized
that they could make their names immortal in other ways
than by despoiling their own and others' subjects. The Em-
peror sent his aunt a mandate to undertake the negotiations
in his name, but his instructions included such high demands
that Margaret decided on her own responsibility to keep her
commission secret, in the hope of rescuing the peace in a
personal discussion with her sister-in-law, without disap-
pointing the Emperor too much.

For Margaret did not doubt that her diplomatic mastery-
would get the upper hand of the French Queen Mother.
And as so often before, she once again reinforced the effect
of her talents by a rich and impressive setting, a grandiose

246 The Chess Player

presentation of the drama of this meeting that was to take
place in the same Cambrai where her conference with the
Cardinal-Legate of Amboise had once before brought about
cooperation between her nephew and France. For the trip
to Cambrai Margaret's ladies received new dresses. Her
pages and lackeys looked gay in their new doublets and hose,
the archers of her bodyguard resplendent in brand-new
white taffeta bonnets and striped hose, half white, half
brown-and-white. Even Neuteken, Madame's "pastime",
the little dwarf, who cheered her with her jokes when she
could find no distraction any more from her pressing cares,
was put into a little costume of iridescent striped satin "bon
et beau satin raye de couleur changeant" in which she was
doubtlessly meant to enchant the eye of Madame d'An-
gouleme.

Margaret knew the effect of luxury and splendor, the
persuasive power of outward show. In newly upholstered
litters, on horses whose costly harnesses aroused the admira-
tion of everyone, the Burgundian embassy traveled to Cam-
brai. And the Abbot of St. Aubert, who had the honor of
lodging Madame de Savoie, was one of the first to be im-
pressed by the imperial air with which the Regent of the
Netherlands made her entry into his abbey. Not until her
litter had been carried into the building and set down before
the door of her room did she step out. She had not thought
it desirable that attention should be drawn to the fact that
she could hardly walk.

Opposite the abbey of St. Aubert in which Margaret
stayed, Madame d'Angouleme had taken up her residence
in the "hotel St. Pol". Across the street separating the two
buildings a covered passage had been constructed for this
occasion, so that the rulers actually lived in one house and

Ladies' Peace

could visit each other without the formalities etiquette de-
manded whenever they left their houses. And they knew
the value of keeping out of the public eye. For representa-
tives from the whole of Europe had flocked to Cambrai, to
keep informed of the expectations, the suppositions, the
chances, and the rumors. No less than eight cardinals, ten
archbishops, three-and-thirty bishops, four princes of the
blood, fifteen dukes, and countless nobles and ecclesiastics
of lower rank filled the monasteries and the houses of dis-
tinguished citizens with their colorful display. The small
streets were too narrow for the festive throng of courtiers
and churchmen, clerics and halberdiers. The city was like a
multicolored beehive and buzzed with excitement, while
the two ladies, invisible save to their most confidential coun-
cilors, decided the fate of Europe and the future of Christen-
dom.

For three weeks the negotiations between the two sisters-
in-law were carried on. And finally, after the last points of
difference had been removed by which the conference had
more than once almost come to grief, on July 24, 1529, they
settled the definitive wording of the peace of Cambrai, that
"Paix des Dames" which was to live in history as the master-
piece of Margaret of Austria and the triumph of feminine
diplomacy over masculine force. What the Emperor had
not been able to conquer with weapons, his aunt had been
able to achieve with the persuasive power of her elegance,
her tact, her tenaciousness and her gold. No influence that
could be won in the entourage of the French Queen Mother
had been too trivial for Margaret. Just as Neuteken the
dwarf had been given a new costume, so her little counter-
part from France "la sotte de madame la regente de
France" had been honored with a crimson hood. An at-

1 toe L h ess flayer

mosphere of benevolence toward Burgundy grew up around
Madame d'Angouleme, thanks to Burgundian gold. And
the French regent finally signed an agreement that was
scarcely less humiliating to France than the treaty of Madrid
had been. Only his possession of Burgundy did the Emperor
waive, and only for the time being, reserving his rights for
some later occasion.

Margaret's victory was complete, and the concession she
had made in the matter of Burgundy was richly compen-
sated through the hundreds of thousands of guilders paid by
Francis I in ransom for his sons, in liquidation of Charles's
English debts, and in contribution to Charles's journey to
Italy. The Ladies' Peace assured the safety of the Nether-
lands borders, relieved Flanders and Artois from their feudal
allegiance to France, paralyzed the enemies of Habsburg
who had always been dangerous only through the support
of France. The Regent experienced the hour of her greatest
triumph. The aim she had set herself at the beginning of her
regency had been reached. And she had furthermore pre-
sented her nephew the Emperor with a world power with
which not a single competitor could interfere.

For on the day the conditions of the peace were published,
the English ambassadors hastened to conclude a treaty of
peace and friendship with the representative of the all-
powerful Emperor. And on that same day the Queen Mother
of France, the Regent of the Netherlands, and the English
envoys knelt before the high altar of Notre Dame of Cam-
brai, and swore to the treaty that was to restore the illusion
of peace to an afflicted Europe.

The church ceremony was at an end. Fanfares blared.
And the vaulted arches of the cathedral echoed the cry of
the herald-at-arms: "La paix est faite!" "Peace has been
made!"

Fortune, Injortune, Fortune

* I 'HE wheel turned. Out of cares and disappointments
JL Margaret's stars had lifted her once again to peaks of
power, to summits where every ambition was gratified,
where scarcely a shadow darkened the glorious moment.
What could the world still offer her after these triumphs?
Her work was completed, her task fulfilled.

On the 2yth of February, 1530, she had been able to in-
form her subjects in the Netherlands that their lord, the
Emperor-elect, had received the imperial crown from the
hands of the Holy Father himself. The time was drawing
near when her longing for rest could at last be satisfied, when
she would be able to render account of her stewardship to
her nephew, in order then to seek, amongst "all her dear
daughters", the sisters of Our Lady of Seven Sorrows, the
repose her office could never give her.

The leg ailment which had repeatedly troubled her during
these last years and for which her doctor had been treating
her during the conferences at Cambrai tortured her in the
early days of November, 1530, with cruel pains. The doctors,
who thought their mistress was suffering from the gout, re-
sorted to the treatments their inadequate science prescribed

249

250 Margaret of Austria

in this affliction. But their error soon appeared. The pains
increased, and a high fever showed "that the humors of the
leg were mounting upward" "que les humeurs de sa jambe
montoient en haulte". The three physicians decided to give
Madame relief by opening her badly swollen leg, "to evacu-
ate the humors" "pour faire evacuer les humeurs".

It seemed at first that they had judged correctly. Improve-
ment set in, the fever subsided. It seemed that their patient
would speedily get well.

But the next evening it became evident that their science
had failed them. Signs of infection appeared, the patient suf-
fered unbearable pain. And while the most skilled practi-
tioners of Flanders were commanded to the sickbed of their
ruler, the "black sisters" of Malines attempted to ease her
torments, supporting her with hastily contrived down pil-
lows.

The patient herself was the first to understand that she
would not recover from this illness. She demanded her father
confessor and her notary, and signed a number of legacies for
her servants, for the weeping women who were tending their
mistress in her misery with touching devotion. On Novem-
ber 3oth she was so exhausted that she felt the moment had
come to hand over her powers of government to Count van
Hoogstraten.

It was no longer granted her to render account to her
nephew and Emperor, nor had she been able to transmit her
wise counsel to the young ruler over whose fate she had
watched for so many years. But she could not go hence with-
out a last greeting, a final counsel to this man whom she
looked upon as her own son.

Her secretary seated himself beside her deathbed. And

Fortune, Infortune, Fortune . . . 251

Margaret dictated her letter to Charles, a letter reflecting in
simplest language the thoughts and f eelings that filled her in
these last hours of her life and that were not to be driven
out even by the most intolerable suffering:

"Monseigneur, the hour is come when I can no longer
write you with my own hand, for I find myself in such an
indisposition that I doubt my life will be but brief. I am pre-
pared and at rest in my conscience, and in all ways resolved
to receive what it pleases God to send me; I have no regrets
whatever, save for the privation of your presence, and that
I can neither see nor speak with you once more before my
death, for which I shall (on account of the doubt above men-
tioned) compensate in part by this my letter, which, I fear,
will be the last you will receive from me. I have appointed
you my sole and universal heir in everything, and executor
of my will; the carrying out of which I recommend to you.
I leave you your lands over here, which, during your absence,
I have not only maintained as you left them at your depar-
ture, but have greatly augmented; I turn back to you the
government of these, in which I believe I have loyally ac-
quitted myself, and so much so that I hope for divine remu-
neration, for your contentment, monseigneur, and for the
good will of your subjects. I particularly commend to you
peace, and especially with the Kings of France and England.
And, finally, I beseech you, monseigneur, to let the love it
has pleased you to bear this poor body be a reminder of the
salvation of the soul, and a recommendation of my poor
servants, commending you lastly to God, whom I beseech,
monseigneur, that he grant you prosperity and long life. At
Malines, the last day of November, 1 530. Your very humble
aunt, Margaret."

252 M&rgavet of Austria

"Monseigneur, 1'heure est venue que ne vous puis plus
escripre de ma main, car je me trouve en telle indisposition
que doubte ma vie estre brefve. Je suis pourvue et reposee
de ma conscience, et de tout resolue a recevoir ce qu'il plaira
a Dieu m'envoyer; je n'ai regret quelconque, reserve de la
privation de vostre presence, et de ne vous pouvoir voir ni
parler encore une f ois avant ma mort, ce que (pour le doubte
que dessus) suppleray en partie par ceste mienne lettre, qui,
je le crains, sera la derniere que aurez de moy. Je vous ay
institue mon heritier universel seul et pour le tout, au charges
de mon testament; Taccomplissement duquel vous recom-
mande. Je vous laisse vos pays de par dega que, durant vostre
absence, n'ay seullement gardes, comme me les laissates a
vostre partement, mais grandement augmentez; je vous rends
le gouvernement d'iceulx, auquel me cuyde estre lealement
acquittee, et tellement que j'en espere remuneration divine,
contentement de vous, monseigneur, et gre de vos subjects.
Je vous recommande singulierement la paix, et par especial
avec les roys de France et d'Angleterre. Et, pour fin, vous
supplie, monseigneur, que 1'amour qu'il vous a plcu porter au
povre corps, soit memoire du salut de Tame, et recommanda-
tion de mes povres serviteurs et servantes, vous disant le
dernier a Dieu, auquel je supplie, monseigneur, vous donner
prosperite et longue vie. De Malines, le dernier jour de no-
vembre 1530. Votre ttis-humble tante, Marguerite."

In the face of Death she was able to put into words her
deepest convictions, those unassailable certainties with
which she was herself imbued and which she wished to pass
on to her foster son. She, who during years of power had
known only struggle, and who in consideration of her man-

Fortune, Infortune, Fortune ... 253
date had had constantly to go against the longing of her sub-
jects for peace, found on her deathbed the strength to rec-
ommend peace to her belligerent nephew. After a lifetime
of dynastic quarrels with France, she realized in this hour the
necessity for friendly cooperation with the royal house she
had feared and humiliated.

That strength of soul with which, already in her youth,
amid the storms of her journey to Spain, she had faced death
did not forsake her now that she lay, stretched helpless in an
agony of pain, knowing that her last hours had come. But
the ironic resignation with which she had accepted her lot in
those days had made way for the calm and exalted resigna-
tion with which she now took leave of her earthly posses-
sions, her earthly affections. Her last prayers were for the
repose of her soul, and for her "poor servants", whose tears
even could not make this parting bitter for her.

"I have no regrets whatever". It was the voice of one who
had done with happiness and sorrow, with the bitterness and
sweetness of this life.

A procession wound through the streets of Malines that
day to implore the help of Heaven for the preservation of
the Regent's life. At the Court of Savoy mourning de-
scended upon the hearts of those who had devoted their
lives to the service of a human, considerate mistress. In the
night of November 30th, between midnight and one o'clock
in the morning, this heroic woman's heart ceased to beat.
Margaret of Austria had fought her last fight.

The mausoleum she had built in distant Brou, so that she
might repose there beside the husband whose undying youth

Margaret of Austria

had remained her finest illusion, was not yet ready when
Margaret closed her eyes. Her embalmed body was therefore
temporarily conveyed to the convent of Our Lady of Seven
Sorrows at Bruges, where she had wished to end her life and
to which, in gratitude for what she had hoped to find there,
she had willed her heart. Here, before the altar in the convent
chapel, where the gray nuns with their scarlet scapulars
came to pray for the peace of their founder's soul, the mortal
remains of the Regent lay until, upon a day in May, 1 532, a
slow funeral procession left the tender-green land of Flan-
ders to undertake the long journey, past cities and villages
that had once greeted the young bride of the Duke of Savoy,
past orchards and vineyards, along fields where the country-
folk, astonished at the sight of such luxurious mourning,
looked up from their work in the eternal earth, under the
eternal skies.

BilAiograph VindpI Works
Consulted

The poems preceding each chapter are taken
from the Alburns poetiques de Marguerite
cTAutriche, fid. M. Frangon, Paris, 1934

Baumgarten, H., Geschichte Karls V. (Stuttgart, 1885).

Van Den Berg, L. P. G, Correspondance de Marguerite <-
Autriche avec ses amis sur les affaires des Pays Eos (La
Haye, 1842-1847, 2 vols.).

De Boom, Ghislaine, Marguerite cTAutriche-Savoie et la Renais-
sance (Paris-Bruxelles, 1935).

Bruchet, M., Marguerite <? Autriche, Duchesse de Savoie (Lille,
1927).

Bruchet, M., et E. Lancien, Itineraire de Marguerite d* Autriche,
Gouvernante des Pays Bos (Lille, 1934).

Carton de Wiart, Marguerite d* Autriche, une princesse beige de
la renaissance (Paris, 1935).

De Commines, P., Memoir es (fid. Dupont).

Ehrenberg, R., Das Zeitalter der Fugger (Jena, 1896).

Frangon, M., Albums poetiques de Marguerite d? Autriche
(Paris, 1934).

Cachet, E., Albums et oeuvres poetiques de Marguerite <? Au-
triche (Mons, 1849).

255

256 Margaret of Austria

Le Glay, Correspondance de FEmpereur Maximilien ler et de
Marguerite d'Autriche sa fills, Gouvernante des Pays Bas
(Paris, 1845, 2 vols.).

Hare, Christopher, The High and Puissant Princess Marguerite
of Austria (London, 1907).

Hare, Christopher, Maximilian the Dreamer } Holy Roman Em-
peror, 1459-1519 (London, 1913).

Henne, A., Histoire du Regne de Charles-Quint en Belgique
(Bruxelles et Leipzig, 1858-1860).

Heyck, Ed., Kaiser Maximilian L (Bielefeld und Leipzig, 1898).

Kooperberg, L. M. G., Margaretha van Oostenrijk, Landvoogdes
der Nederlanden (tot den vrede van Kamerijk) (Amster-
dam, 1908).

Kraus, Victor, Maximilians L vertratdicher Briefwechsel mit
Sigmund Pruschenk, Freiherrn in Stettenberg (Innsbruck,
1875).

Lemaire de Beiges, Jean, Oeuvres, IV (fid. Stecher, 1891).

Michelet, J., Histoire de France, j-tf (Paris, 1871-1874).

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